Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Mary Oliver

I spent today with Mary Oliver. She sat in my pocket; the one on the left on my backside, which is so rarely used as the wallet is designated to the right back pocket. I took her out here and there to read her wisdom of being In Blackwater woods.

I love poems, and I have had a rather late introduction to Mary Oliver and some of her wonderful thoughts. Today was a very productive day. I bought grain for all the growing and very hungry chicks, moved some baby bunnies to the new farm, cut out the edges of the field, dropped the septic design off at Concord, picked up bread, finished up the middle piece of the garden and with some mostly hopeful thinking added some lime before the rains, then separated a pregnant pig, and now am inside with you- and Mary Oliver. Throughout the day I would pull out her work and enjoy the smooth words in between work and being nervous about the many things that need to be done on the farm and house. Below is her poem, In Blackwater Woods- and I hope you enjoy it.

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
Mr. Collins looking down (condescendingly) at the camera. I left a candy on top of the bales, and leaped, and landed on the top bale with my knees, but slid off. You stared down on me as if apologetic of my non-fluidity- my inability to place my body into the curve of a movement that loses itself over space.

Grandpa showing me how to weld on a jack to a trailer I picked up for my tractor. Zac did alright, but definitely needs some work.

1 comment:

  1. The poem was exactly what I needed to read although the tears are making posting hard. Tomorrow I leave the beach until fall which means leaving two of my kids, my mortal loves, behind.

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