Trout Lily

It happened that I couldn’t find in all my books

more than a picture and a few words concerning

the trout lily,

so I shut my eyes.

And let the darkness come in

and roll me back.

The old creek

began to sing in my ears

as it rolled along, like the hair of spring,

and the young girl I used to be

heard it also,

as she came swinging into the woods,

truant from everything as usual

except the clear globe of the day, and its

beautiful details.

Then she stopped,

where the first trout lilies of the year

had sprung from the ground

with their spotted bodies

and their six-antlered bright faces,

and their many red tongues.

If she spoke to them, I don’t remember what she said,

and if they kindly answered, it’s a gift that can’t be broken

by giving it away.

All I know is, there was a light that lingered, for hours,

under her eyelids–that made a difference

when she went back to a difficult house, at the end of the day.

~Mary Oliver~

Longing for the warmth of Summer

 

Daisies

It is possible, I suppose that sometime 

we will learn everything 

there is to learn: what the world is, for example, 

and what it means. I think this as I am crossing 

from one field to another, in summer, and the 

mockingbird is mocking me, as one who either 

knows enough already or knows enough to be 

perfectly content not knowing. Song being born 

of quest he knows this: he must turn silent 

were he suddenly assaulted with answers. Instead 

oh hear his wild, caustic, tender warbling ceaselessly 

unanswered. At my feet the white-petalled daisies display 

the small suns of their center piece, their - if you don't 

mind my saying so - their hearts. Of course 

I could be wrong, perhaps their hearts are pale and 

narrow and hidden in the roots. What do I know? 

But this: it is heaven itself to take what is given, 

to see what is plain; what the sun lights up willingly; 

for example - I think this 

as I reach down, not to pick but merely to touch - 

the suitability of the field for the daisies, and the 

daisies for the field.

~Mary Oliver~

Baby foxes

 Photos taken by Roger in Sonoma, California ~ click on images to see the cuteness!

This World

I would like to write a poem about the world that has in it

nothing fancy.

But it seems impossible.

Whatever the subject, the morning sun

glimmers it.

The tulip feels the heat and flaps its petals open and becomes a star.

The ants bore into the peony bud and there is a dark

pinprick well of sweetness.

As for the stones on the beach, forget it.

Each one could be set in gold.

So I tried with my eyes shut, but of course the birds

were singing.

And the aspen trees were shaking the sweetest music

out of their leaves.

And that was followed by, guess what, a momentous and

beautiful silence

as comes to all of us, in little earfuls, if we’re not too

hurried to hear it.

As for spiders, how the dew hangs in their webs

even if they say nothing, or seem to say nothing.

So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe they sing.

So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe the stars sing too,

and the ants, and the peonies, and the warm stones,

so happy to be where they are, on the beach, instead of being

locked up in gold.

~ Mary Oliver ~

 

The Journey

 The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.

~ Mary Oliver ~

Straight Talk from Fox

Straight Talk From Fox

Listen says fox it is music to run
over the hills to lick
dew from the leaves to nose along
the edges of the ponds to smell the fat
ducks in their bright feathers but
far out, safe in their rafts of
sleep. It is like
music to visit the orchard, to find
the vole sucking the sweet of the apple, or the
rabbit with his fast-beating heart. Death itself
is a music. Nobody has ever come close to
writing it down, awake or in a dream. It cannot
be told. It is flesh and bones
changing shape and with good cause, mercy
is a little child beside such an invention. It is
music to wander the black back roads
outside of town no one awake or wondering
if anything miraculous is ever going to
happen, totally dumb to the fact of every
moment's miracle. Don't think I haven't
peeked into windows. I see you in all your seasons
making love, arguing, talking about God
as if he were an idea instead of the grass,
instead of the stars, the rabbit caught
in one good teeth-whacking hit and brought
home to the den. What I am, and I know it, is
responsible, joyful, thankful. I would not
give my life for a thousand of yours.

~Mary Oliver~

Photos taken 12-12-09 at the swamp by B. Fontana and used with gratitude.
Click on images to enlarge them. 

Beauty in black and white

The Swan

Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air -
An armful of white blossoms,
A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings; a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
Biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
A shrill dark music - like the rain pelting the trees - like a waterfall
Knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds -
A white cross Streaming across the sky, its feet
Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?

© Mary Oliver. From The Paris Review # 124, Fall, 1992

Abuela

The Turtle

breaks from the blue-black
skin of the water, dragging her shell
with its mossy scutes
across the shallows and through the rushes
and over the mudflats, to the uprise,
to the yellow sand,
to dig with her ungainly feet
a nest, and hunker there spewing
her white eggs down
into the darkness, and you think

of her patience, her fortitude,
her determination to complete
what she was born to do----
and then you realize a greater thing----
she doesn’t consider
what she was born to do.
She’s only filled
with an old blind wish.
It isn’t even hers but came to her
in the rain or the soft wind
which is a gate through which her life keeps walking.

She can’t see
herself apart from the rest of the world
or the world from what she must do
every spring.
Crawling up the high hill,
luminous under the sand that has packed against her skin,
she doesn’t dream
she knows
she is a part of the pond she lives in,
the tall trees are her children,
the birds that swim above her
are tied to her by an unbreakable string.

~ Mary Oliver ~

(Dream Work)