by Ted Kooser, (Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004 to 2006, from his book of poems following cancer treatment, “Winter Morning Walks/One Hunder Post Cards to Jim Harrison”)

Walking in the darkness, in awe,
beneath a billion indifferent stars
at quarter to six in the morning,
the moon already down
and gone, but keeping a pale lamp burning
at the edge of the west,
my shoes too loud in the gravel
that, faintly lit, looks to be little more
than a contrail of vapor,
so thin, so insubstantial it could,
on a whim, let me drop through it
and out of the day,
but I have taught myself
to place one foot ahead of the other
in noisy confidence
as if each morning might be trusted,
as if the sounds I make might buoy me up.

(thanks to Steve-O)