Books |
Mary Oliver (1935-2019)
By
Published: Jan 17, 2019
Category:
Poetry
Mary Oliver has died. She was 83. Appropriately, her obituary in the New York Times cites her poem, “When Death Comes.”
When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.
She was no visitor here, which is one reason she was the most popular — that is, best-selling — poet in America. If you read poetry, her style and lunge-into-life message immediately identify the poet for you. Even if you’re only an occasional reader of poetry, you probably know that conversational voice, because it’s almost impossible to be unfamiliar with her most famous line: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?”
The book to buy is “Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver.” It contains her favorite poems, a greatest hits collection that starts with her first book in 1963 and ends with her 2015 collection. The themes are consistent: nature (“There is only one question; / how to love this world”), joy (“Joy is not made to be a crumb”), spiritual uplift (“Lord God, mercy is in your hands, pour / me a little”). That’s not a combination you’ll find in the work of any other contemporary poet. [To buy the book from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
The smart move in dealing with Mary Oliver isn’t to praise her, but to quote her — her most concise poems are the best argument for reading many more.
“Wild Geese”
You do not have to be good. / You do not have to walk on your knees / for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. / You only have to let the soft animal of your body / love what it loves. / Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. / Meanwhile the world goes on. / Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain / are moving across the landscapes, / over the prairies and the deep trees, / the mountains and the rivers. / Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, / are heading home again. / Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, / the world offers itself to your imagination, / calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting— / over and over announcing your place / in the family of things.
“I Worried”
I worried a lot. Will the garden grow, will the rivers
flow in the right direction, will the earth turn
as it was taught, and if not how shall
I correct it?
Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven,
can I do better?
Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows
can do it and I am, well,
hopeless.
Is my eyesight fading or am I just imagining it,
am I going to get rheumatism,
lockjaw, dementia?
Finally I saw that worrying had come to nothing.
And gave it up. And took my old body
and went out into the morning,
and sang
“The World I Live In”
I have refused to live
locked in the orderly house of
reasons and proofs;
The world I live in and believe in
is wider than that. And anyway.
what’s wrong with Maybe?
You wouldn’t believe what once or
twice I have seen. I’ll just
tell you this:
only if there are angels in your head will you
ever, possibly, see one.
“Don’t Hesitate”
If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happened better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.
“Of The Empire”
We will be known as a culture that feared death
and adored power, that tried to vanquish insecurity
for the few and cared little for the penury of the
many. We will be known as a culture that taught
and rewarded the amassing of things, that spoke
little if at all about the quality of life for
people (other people), for dogs, for rivers. All
the world, in our eyes, they will say, was a
commodity. And they will say that this structure
was held together politically, which it was, and
they will say also that our politics was no more
than an apparatus to accommodate the feelings of
the heart, and that the heart, in those days,
was small, and hard, and full of meanness.
“At Blackwater Pond”
At Blackwater Pond the tossed waters have
settled
after a night of rain.
I dip my cupped hands. I drink
a long time. It tastes
like stone, leaves, fire. It falls cold
into my body, waking the bones. I hear them
deep inside me, whispering
oh what is that beautiful thing
that just happened?
Of all the poems she wrote, there’s one I especially wish I’d written.
Every day
I see or hear
something
that more or less
kills me
with delight,
that leaves me
like a needle
in the haystack
of light.
