#Delight

The Courage to Stubbornly Accept Our Gladness

The line comes from "A Brief for the Defense" in Refusing Heaven (2005), a poem that surveys famine, war, and everyday grief while insisting that delight still belongs to us. Gilbert, who wrote elegies like "Michiko Dead" after the loss of his partner Michiko Nogami, knew sorrow intimately. Yet he contends that the world’s "ruthless furnace" does not nullify gladness; it intensifies its urgency. Thus, the poem’s insistence on delight is not denial but a hard-earned verdict rendered in full view of suffering. [...]

Choosing Joy: A Stubborn, Necessary Risk

At the outset, Jack Gilbert’s imperative to ‘risk delight’ sets a moral frame. In his poem A Brief for the Defense, collected in Refusing Heaven (2005), he argues for gladness ‘in the ruthless furnace of this world.’ Rather than frivolity, this is courage: to let oneself be moved by beauty despite grief’s certainty. Because cynicism often masquerades as wisdom, choosing gladness requires stubbornness; it means staking dignity on the belief that tenderness belongs alongside ruin. Thus, the risk is not naiveté but commitment—to the world as it truly is, which contains both devastation and radiance. [...]

Embracing Risk on the Path to Genuine Delight

Looking to nature—and to creativity, which Sarton cherished—we find countless examples of risk as the price for brilliance. A seed must split to sprout; an artist must dare a blank canvas. Sarton’s own garden, chronicled in 'Plant Dreaming Deep' (1968), is replete with moments when tending to beauty required enduring both literal and metaphorical storms. Thus, risking delight becomes an act of ongoing engagement with life’s unpredictability. [...]

Life Is Not Meant to Be Easy - George S. Clason

Clason advises individuals to take courage despite life's challenges. This suggests that resilience and bravery are essential qualities for navigating tough times. [...]