On Writing Well

I have always considered myself a writer. But there are times when I come across a great piece of prose and I realize, sadly, that I am no writer, I am only a person who writes. For instance, I read this passage below several times and it was so beautiful I got a lump in my throat, not just because of the content of the paragraph, but because of the way it was written. I marvel at people who see the world like this and who can express it, so beautifully, to the rest of us.

From "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard:

"One day I was walking along Tinker Creek thinking of nothing at all and I saw the tree with the lights in it. I saw the backyard cedar where the mourning doves roost charged and transfigured, each cell buzzing with flame. I stood on the grass with the lights in it, grass that was wholly fire, utterly focused and utterly dreamed. It was less like seeing than like being for the first time seen, knocked breathless by a powerful glance...I had been my whole life a bell, and never knew it until at that moment I was lifted and struck."

I mean...wow. Isn't that something? So beautifully expressed.