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I Don't Know Exactly What A Prayer Is. I Do Know How To Pay Attention, How To Fall Down Into The Grass, How To Kneel Down In The Grass, How To Be Idle And Blessed, How To Stroll Through The Fields, Which Is What I Have Been Doing All Day. Tell Me, What Else Should I Have Done? Doesn't Everything Die At Last, And Too Soon? Tell Me, What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild And Precious Life?

-Mary Oliver

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I Don't Know Exactly

Mary Oliver

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I Don't Know Exactly What A Prayer Is. I Do Know How To Pay Attention, How To Fall Down Into The Grass, How To Kneel Down In The Grass, How To Be Idle And Blessed, How To Stroll Through The Fields, Which Is What I Have Been Doing All Day. Tell Me, What Else Should I Have Done? Doesn't Everything Die At Last, And Too Soon? Tell Me, What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild And Precious Life?

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Look, Hasn't My Body Already Felt Like The Body Of A Flower?

Today I Am Altogether Without Ambition. Where Did I Get Such Wisdom?

And That Is Just The Point... How The World, Moist And Beautiful, Calls To Each Of Us To Make A New And Serious Response. That's The Big Question, The One The World Throws At You Every Morning. "here You Are, Alive. Would You Like To Make A Comment?

I Wanted The Past To Go Away, I Wanted To Leave It, Like Another Country; I Wanted My Life To Close, And Open Like A Hinge, Like A Wing, Like The Part Of The Song Where It Falls Down Over The Rocks: An Explosion, A Discovery; I Wanted To Hurry Into The Work Of My Life; I Wanted To Know, Whoever I Was, I Was Alive For A Little While.

Of Course! The Path To Heaven Doesn't Lie Down In Flat Miles. It's In The Imagination With Which You Perceive This World, And The Gestures With Which You Honor It.

We Do Not Love Anything More Deeply Than We Love A Story.

Someone I Loved Once Gave Me A Box Full Of Darkness. It Took Me Years To Understand That This Too, Was A Gift.

For Some Things There Are No Wrong Seasons. Which Is What I Dream Of For Me.

You, Too, Can Be Carved Anew By The Details Of Your Devotion.

Are My Boots Old? Is My Coat Torn? / Am I No Longer Young, And Still Not Half-perfect?

The World Is: Fun, And Familiar, And Healthful, And Unbelievably Refreshing, And Lovely. And It Is The Theater Of The Spiritual; It Is The Multiform Utterly Obedient To A Mystery.

I Wanted To Hurry Into The Work Of My Life; I Wanted To Know, Whoever I Was, I Was Alive For A Little While.

I Had A Dog Who Loved Flowers. Briskly She Went Through The Fields, Yet Paused For The Honeysuckle Or The Rose, Her Dark Head And Her Wet Nose Touching The Face Of Every One With Its Petals Of Silk With Its Fragrance Rising Into The Air Where The Bees, Their Bodies Heavy With Pollen Hovered - And Easily She Adored Every Blossom Not In The Serious Careful Way That We Choose This Blossom Or That Blossom The Way We Praise Or Don't Praise - The Way We Love Or Don't Love - But The Way We Long To Be - That Happy In The Heaven Of Earth - That Wild, That Loving.

...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.

Also I Wanted To Be Able To Love And We All Know How That One Goes, Don't We? Slowly

I Tell You This To Break Your Heart, By Which I Mean Only That It Break Open And Never Close Again To The Rest Of The World.

I Believe In Kindness. Also In Mischief.

Joy Is Not Made To Be A Crumb. (don't Hesitate)

Along With The Differences That Abide In Each Of Us, There Is Also In Each Of Us A Maverick, The Darling Stubborn One Who Won't Listen, Who Insists, Who Chooses Preference Or The Spirited Guess Over Yardsticks Or Even History. I Suspect This Maverick Is Somewhat What The Soul Is, Or At Least That The Soul Lives Close By And Companionably With Its Agitating And Inquiring Force.

I Don't Ask For The Sights In Front Of Me To Change, Only The Depth Of My Seeing.

In College, You Learn How To Learn. Four Years Is Not Too Much Time To Spend At That.

I Learned To Build Bookshelves And Brought Books To My Room, Gathering Them Around Me Thickly. I Read By Day And Into The Night. I Thought About Perfectibility, And Deism, And Adjectives, And Clouds, And The Foxes, I Locked My Door, From The Inside, And Leaped From The Roof And Went To The Woods, By Day Or Darkness.

Attention Is The Beginning Of Devotion.

When The Blackberries Hang Swollen In The Woods, In The Brambles Nobody Owns, I Spend All Day Among The High Branches, Reaching My Ripped Arms, Thinking Of Nothing, Cramming The Black Honey Of Summer Into My Mouth; All Day My Body Accepts What It Is. In The Dark Creeks That Run By There Is This Thick Paw Of My Life Darting Among The Black Bells, The Leaves; There Is This Happy Tongue.

And I Do Not Want Anymore To Be Useful, To Be Docile, To Lead / Children Out Of The Fields Into The Text / Of Civility, To Teach Them That They Are (they Are Not) Better Than The Grass.

Though I Play At The Edges Of Knowing, Truly I Know Our Part Is Not Knowing, But Looking, And Touching, And Loving

You Want To Cry Aloud For Your Mistakes. But To Tell The Truth The World Doesn't Need Any More Of That Sound.

I Want To Think Again Of Dangerous And Noble Things. I Want To Be Light And Frolicsome. I Want To Be Improbable And Beautiful And Afraid Of Nothing As Though I Had Wings.

Love, Love, Love, Says Percy. And Hurry As Fast As You Can Along The Shining Beach, Or The Rubble, Or The Dust. Then, Go To Sleep. Give Up Your Body Heat, Your Beating Heart. Then, Trust.

I Want To Be Braver And More Honest About My Life. When You're Sexually Abused, There's A Lot Of Damage.

A Fact: One Picks It Up And Reads It, And Puts It Down, And There Is An End To It. But An Idea! That One May Pick Up, And Reflect Upon, And Oppose, And Expand, And So Pass A Delightful Afternoon Altogether.

Little Dogs Rhapsody In The Night (percy Three) He Puts His Cheek Against Mine And Makes Small, Expressive Sounds. And When I'm Awake, Or Awake Enough He Turns Upside Down, His Four Paws In The Air And His Eyes Dark And Fervent. Tell Me You Love Me, He Says. Tell Me Again. Could There Be A Sweeter Arrangement? Over And Over He Gets To Ask It. I Get To Tell.

It Is What I Was Born For - To Look, To Listen, To Lose Myself Inside This Soft World - To Instruct Myself Over And Over.

There Were Times Over The Years When Life Was Not Easy, But If You're Working A Few Hours A Day And You've Got A Good Book To Read, And You Can Go Outside To The Beach And Dig For Clams, You're Okay.

Because Of The Dog's Joyfulness, Our Own Is Increased. It Is No Small Gift. It Is Not The Least Reason Why We Should Honor As Well As Love The Dog Of Our Own Life, And The Dog Down The Street, And All The Dogs Not Yet Born. What Would The World Be Like Without Music Or Rivers Or The Green And Tender Grass? What Would This World Be Like Without Dogs?

In The Glare Of Your Mind, Be Modest. And Beholden To What Is Tactile, And Thrilling.

I Held My Breath As We Do Sometimes To Stop Time When Something Wonderful Has Touched Us.

It's Not A Competition, It's A Doorway.

Special Education

The Man Who Has Many Answers Is Often Found In The Theaters Of Information Where He Offers, Graciously, His Deep Findings. While The Man Who Has Only Questions, To Comfort Himself, Makes Music.

Maybe The World, Without Us, Is The Real Poem.

Like Magellan, Let Us Find Our Islands To Die In, Far From Home, From Anywhere Familiar. Let Us Risk The Wildest Places, Lest We Go Down In Comfort, And Despair.

The Poem In Which The Reader Does Not Feel Himself Or Herself A Participant Is A Lecture, Listened To From An Uncomfortable Chair, In A Stuffy Room, Inside A Building.

For Poems Are Not Words, After All, But Fires For The Cold, Ropes Let Down To The Lost, Something As Necessary As Bread In The Pockets Of The Hungry.

Do You Love This World? Do You Cherish Your Humble And Silky Life? Do You Adore The Green Grass, With Its Terror Beneath?

I Simply Do Not Distinguish Between Work And Play.

But I Also Say This: That Light Is An Invitation To Happiness, And That Happiness, When It's Done Right, Is A Kind Of Holiness, Palpable And Redemptive.

The End Of Life Has Its Own Nature, Also Worth Our Attention. I Don't Say This Without Reckoning In The Sorrow, The Worry, The Many Diminishments. But Surely It Is Then That A Person's Character Shines Or Glooms.

Snow Was Falling, So Much Like Stars Filling The Dak Trees That One Could Easily Imagine Its Reason For Being Was Nothing More The Prettiness.

I Don't Know Lots Of Things But I Know This: Next Year When Spring Flows Over The Starting Point I'll Think I'm Going To Drown In The Shimmering Miles Of It.

Hello, Sun In My Face. Hello You Who Made The Morning And Spread It Over The Fields...watch, Now, How I Start The Day In Happiness, In Kindness.

A Dog Is Adorable And Noble, A Dog Is A True And Loving Friend. A Dog Is Also A Hedonist.

So This Is How You Swim Inward. So This Is How You Flow Outwards. So This Is How You Pray.

A Lifetime Isn't Long Enough For The Beauty Of This World And The Responsibilities Of Your Life.

Children Play Earnestly As If It Were Work. But People Grow Up, And They Work With A Sorrow Upon Them. It's Duty.

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.

Do You Cherish Your Humble And Silky Life?

Isn’t It Wonderful The Way The World Holds Both The Deeply Serious, And The Unexpectedly Mirthful?

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 Is 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.

In Your Hands The Dog, The Donkey, Surely They Know They Are Alive. Who Would Argue Otherwise? But Now, After Years Of Consideration, I Am Getting Beyond That. What About The Sunflowers? What About The Tulips, And The Pines? Listen, All You Have To Do Is Start And There’ll Be No Stopping. What About Mountains? What About Water Slipping Over Rocks? And Speaking Of Stones, What About The Little Ones You Can Hold In Your Hands, Their Heartbeats So Secret, So Hidden It May Take Years Before, Finally, You Hear Them?

Why I Wake Early Hello, Sun In My Face. Hello, You Who Made The Morning And Spread It Over The Fields And Into The Faces Of The Tulips And The Nodding Morning Glories, And Into The Windows Of, Even, The Miserable And The Crotchety – Best Preacher That Ever Was, Dear Star, That Just Happens To Be Where You Are In The Universe To Keep Us From Ever-darkness, To Ease Us With Warm Touching, To Hold Us In The Great Hands Of Light – Good Morning, Good Morning, Good Morning. Watch, Now, How I Start The Day In Happiness, In Kindness.

I Thought The Earth Remembered Me, She Took Me Back So Tenderly, Arranging Her Dark Skirts, Her Pockets Full Of Lichens And Seeds. I Slept As Never Before, A Stone On The River Bed, Nothing Between Me And The White Fire Of The Stars But My Thoughts, And They Floated Light As Moths Among The Branches Of The Perfect Trees. All Night I Heard The Small Kingdoms Breathing Around Me, The Insects, And The Birds Who Do Their Work In The Darkness. All Night I Rose And Fell, As If In Water, Grappling With A Luminous Doom. By Morning I Had Vanished At Least A Dozen Times Into Something Better.

The Sea Can Do Craziness, It Can Do Smooth, It Can Lie Down Like Silk Breathing Or Toss Havoc Shoreward; It Can Give Gifts Or Withhold All; It Can Rise, Ebb, Froth Like An Incoming Frenzy Of Fountains, Or It Can Sweet-talk Entirely. As I Can Too, And So, No Doubt, Can You, And You.

When When It’s Over, It’s Over, And We Don’t Know Any Of Us, What Happens Then. So I Try Not To Miss Anything. I Think, In My Whole Life, I Have Never Missed The Full Moon Or The Slipper Of Its Coming Back. Or, A Kiss. Well, Yes, Especially A Kiss.

He Is Exactly The Poem I Wanted To Write.

I Have A Notion That If You Are Going To Be Spiritually Curious, You Better Not Get Cluttered Up With Too Many Material Things.

Follow Your Dreams

But How Did You Come Burning Down Like A Wild Needle, Knowing Just Where My Heart Was?

Still, What I Want In My Life Is To Be Willing To Be Dazzled---to Cast Aside The Weight Of Facts And Maybe Even To Float A Little Above This Difficult World.

Truly, We Live With Mysteries Too Marvelous To Be Understood. How Grass Can Be Nourishing In The Mouths Of The Lambs. How Rivers And Stones Are Forever In Allegiance With Gravity While We Ourselves Dream Of Rising.

I Do Not Live Happily Or Comfortably With The Cleverness Of Our Times. The Talk Is All About Computers, The News Is All About Bombs And Blood. This Morning, In The Fresh Field, I Came Upon A Hidden Nest. It Held Four Warm, Speckled Eggs. I Touched Them. Then Went Away Softly, Having Felt Something More Wonderful Than All The Electricity Of New York City.

So Come To The Pond, Or The River Of Your Imagination, Or The Harbor Of Your Longing, And Put Your Lips To The World. And Live Your Life.

I Thought The Earth Remembered Me, She Took Me Back So Tenderly, Arranging Her Dark Skirts, Her Pockets Full Of Lichens And Seeds. I Slept As Never Before, A Stone On The River Bed, Nothing Between Me And The White Fire Of The Stars.

Wherever I Am, The World Comes After Me. It Offers Me Its Busyness. It Does Not Believe That I Do Not Want It. Now I Understand Why The Old Poets Of China Went So Far And High Into The Mountains, Then Crept Into The Pale Mist.

Tell Me, What Else Should I Have Done? Doesn't Everything Die At Last, And Too Soon? Tell Me, What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild And Precious Life?

How Precious Life Is

Every Spring I Hear The Thrush Singing In The Glowing Woods He Is Only Passing Through. His Voice Is Deep, Then He Lifts It Until It Seems To Fall From The Sky. I Am Thrilled. I Am Grateful. Then, By The End Of Morning, He's Gone, Nothing But Silence Out Of The Tree Where He Rested For A Night. And This I Find Acceptable. Not Enough Is A Poor Life. But Too Much Is, Well, Too Much. Imagine Verdi Or Mahler Every Day, All Day. It Would Exhaust Anyone.

I Know Many Lives Worth Living.

Life Worth Living

I Want To Write Something So Simply About Love Or About Pain That Even As You Are Reading You Feel It And As You Read You Keep Feeling It And Though It Be My Story It Will Be Common, Though It Be Singular It Will Be Known To You So That By The End You Will Think— No, You Will Realize— That It Was All The While Yourself Arranging The Words, That It Was All The Time Words That You Yourself, Out Of Your Heart Had Been Saying.

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.

So Every Day So Every Day I Was Surrounded By The Beautiful Crying Forth Of The Ideas Of God, One Of Which Was You.

And It Is Exceedingly Short, His Galloping Life. Dogs Die So Soon. I Have My Stories Of That Grief, No Doubt Many Of You Do Also. It Is Almost A Failure Of Will, A Failure Of Love, To Let Them Grow Old-or So It Feels. We Would Do Anything To Keep Them With Us, And To Keep Them Young. The One Gift We Cannot Give.

It Is Better For The Heart To Break, Than Not To Break.

Special Education

I Have A Notebook With Me All The Time, And I Begin Scribbling A Few Words. When Things Are Going Well, The Walk Does Not Get Anywhere; I Finally Just Stop And Write.

I Try To Be Good But Sometimes A Person Just Has To Break Out And Act Like The Wild And Springy Thing One Used To Be. It's Impossible Not To Remember Wild An Want It Back.

Love Yourself. Then Forget It. Then, Love The World.

Special Education

... Let Us Risk The Wildest Places, Lest We Go Down In Comfort, And Despair.

And Now I Understand Something So Frightening &wonderful- How The Mind Clings To The Road It Knows, Rushing Through Crossroads, Sticking Like Lint To The Familiar.

Life Is Much The Same When It's Going Well-- Resonant And Unremarkable. But Who, Not Under Disaster's Seal, Can Understand What Life Is Like When It Begins To Crumble?

And Now My Old Dog Is Dead, And Another I Had After Him, And My Parents Are Dead, And That First World, That Old House, Is Sold And Lost, And The Books I Gathered There Lost, Or Sold- But More Books Bought, And In Another Place, Board By Board And Stone By Stone, Like A House, A True Life Built, And All Because I Was Steadfast About One Or Two Things: Loving Foxes, And Poems, The Blank Piece Of Paper, And My Own Energy- And Mostly The Shimmering Shoulders Of The World That Shrug Carelessly Over The Fate Of Any Individual That They May, The Better, Keep The Niles And Amazons Flowing.

As Long As You're Dancing, You Can Break The Rules.

I Was Hurrying Through My Own Soul . . . I Was Leaning Out . . . I Was Listening.

I Have Trouble With Some Books Because I'm So Much In Agreement With Them I'd Rather Just Sit In The Grass Myself.

Sunrise What Is The Name Of The Deep Breath I Would Take Over And Over For All Of Us? Call It Whatever You Want, It Is Happiness, It Is Another One Of The Ways To Enter Fire.

Listen--are You Breathing Just A Little, And Calling It A Life?

You Can Have The Other Words-chance, Luck, Coincidence, Serendipity. I'll Take Grace. I Don't Know What It Is Exactly, But I'll Take It.

We All Have A Hungry Heart, And One Of The Things We Hunger For Is Happiness.

I Decided Very Early That I Wanted To Write. But I Didn't Think Of It As A Career. I Didn't Even Think Of It As A Profession... It Was The Most Exciting Thing, The Most Powerful Thing, The Most Wonderful Thing To Do With My Life.

Who Do You Want To Be In Your One Wild And Precious Life?

I Grew Up In A Sad, Depressed Place. I Got Out. Poetry Saved My Life.

I Read The Way A Person Might Swim, To Save His Or Her Life. I Wrote That Way Too.

Drive Down Any Road, Take A Train Or An Airplane Across The World, Leave Your Old Life Behind, Die And Be Born Again~ Wherever You Arrive They'll Be There First, Glossy And Rowdy And Indistinguishable. The Deep Muscle Of The World.

The Challenge Is To Keep Up With All The New Poets At The Same Time I Love The Old Ones.

Because Of The Dog’s Joyfulness, Our Own Is Increased. It Is No Small Gift.

As A Child, What Captivated Me Was Reading The Poems Myself And Realizing That There Was A World Without Material Substance Which Was Nevertheless As Alive As Any Other.

You Have To Be In The World To Understand What The Spiritual Is About, And You Have To Be Spiritual In Order To Truly Be Able To Accept What The World Is About.

I Have A Little Dog Who Likes To Nap With Me. He Climbs On My Body And Puts His Face In My Neck. He Is Sweeter Than Soap. He Is More Wonderful Than A Diamond Necklace, Which Can't Even Bark.

Said The River: Imagine Everything You Can Imagine, Then Keep On Going.

In This Universe We Are Given Two Gifts: The Ability To Love And The Ability To Question. Which Are, At The Same Time, The Fires That Warm Us And The Fires That Scorch Us.

Ability To Love

Around Me The Trees Stir In Their Leaves And Call Out, Stay Awhile.

...sometimes I Dream That Everything In The World Is Here, In My Room, In A Great Closet, Named And Orderly, And I Am Here Too, In Front Of It, Hardly Able To See For The Flash And The Brightness- And Sometimes I Am That Madcap Person Clapping My Hands And Singing; And Sometimes I Am That Quiet Person Down On My Knees.

We Can Know A Lot. And Still, No Doubt, There Are Rash And Wonderful Ideas Brewing Somewhere; There Are Many Surprises Yet To Come.

My First Two Books Are Out Of Print And, Okay, They Can Sleep There Comfortably. It's Early Work, Derivative Work.

Ordinarily, I Go To The Woods Alone. When I'm Alone I Can Hear The Almost Unhearable Sound Of The Roses Singing. If You Have Ever Gone To The Woods With Me, I Must Love You Very Much.

Things Take The Time They Take. Don't Worry. How Many Roads Did St. Augustine Follow Before He Became St. Augustine?

When Death Comes…. I Want To Step Through The Door Full Of Curiosity, Wondering: What It’s Going To Be Like, That Cottage Of Darkness? And Therefore I Look Upon Everything As A Brotherhood And A Sisterhood, And I Look Upon Time As No More Than An Idea, And I Consider Eternity As Another Possibility, And I Think Of Each Life As A Flower, As Common As A Field Daisy, And As Singular, And Each Name A Comfortable Music In The Mouth, Tending, As All Music Does, Toward Silence, And Each Body As A Lion Of Courage, And Something Precious To The Earth. [from The Poem "when Death Comes"]

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

Rhythm Is One Of The Most Powerful Of Pleasures, And When We Feel A Pleasurable Rhythm We Hope It Will Continue. When It Does, It Grows Sweeter.

Tell Me What It Is You Plan To Do With Your One Wild And Precious Life? 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. Instructions For Living A Life: Pay Attention. Be Astonished. Tell About It.

Writing A Poem ... Is A Kind Of Possible Love Affair Between Something Like The Heart (that Courageous But Also Shy Factory Of Emotion) And The Learned Skills Of The Conscious Mind.

I Know Death Is The Fascinating Snake Under The Leaves, Sliding And Sliding; I Know The Heart Loves Him Too, Can't Turn Away, Can't Break The Spell. Everything Wants To Enter The Slow Thickness, Aches To Be Peaceful Finally And At Any Cost. Wants To Be Stone.

Come With Me Into The Woods Where Spring Is Advancing, As It Does, No Matter What, Not Being Singular Or Particular, But One Of The Forever Gifts, And Certainly Visible.

Poetry Is A Serious Business; Literature Is The Apparatus Through Which The World Tries To Keep Intact Its Important Ideas And Feelings.

I Love The Line Of Flaubert About Observing Things Very Intensely. I Think Our Duty As Writers Begins Not With Our Own Feelings, But With The Powers Of Observing.

You Only Have To Let The Soft Animal Of Your Body Love What It Loves.

There Is Only One Question: / How To Love This World.

I Think One Thing Is That Prayer Has Become More Useful, Interesting, Fruitful, And... Almost Involuntary In My Life.

... The Natural World Is The Old River That Runs Through Everything, And I Think Poets Will Forever Fish Along Its Shores.

I Consider Myself Kind Of A Reporter - One Who Uses Words That Are More Like Music And That Have A Choreography. I Never Think Of Myself As A Poet; I Just Get Up And Write.

And Who Will Care, Who Will Chide You If You Wander Away From Wherever You Are, To Look For Your Soul?

I Got Saved By Poetry. And I Got Saved By The Beauty Of The World.

Beauty Of The World

My Work Is The World. Here The Sunflowers, There The Hummingbird - Equal Seekers Of Sweetness. Here The Quickening Yeast; There The Blue Plums.

Keep Some Room In Your Heart For The Unimaginable.

The Most Regretful People On Earth Are Those Who Felt The Call To Creative Work, Who Felt Their Own Creative Power Restive And Uprising, And Gave To It Neither Power Nor Time.

Let Me Keep My Distance, Always, From Those Who Think They Have The Answers. Let Me Keep Company Always With Those Who Say “look!” And Laugh In Astonishment, And Bow Their Heads. (from “mysteries, Yes”)

It Was Not A Choice Of Writing Or Not Writing. It Was A Choice Of Loving My Life Or Not Loving My Life. To Keep Writing Was Always A First Priority.... I Worked Probably 25 Years By Myself.... Just Writing And Working, Not Trying To Publish Much. Not Giving Readings. A Longer Time Than People Really Are Willing To Commit Before They Want To Go Public.

What Can We Do About God, Who Makes And Then Breaks Every God-forsaken, Beautiful Day?

To Pay Attention, This Is Our Endless And Proper Work.

One Thing I Do Know Is That Poetry, To Be Understood, Must Be Clear.

Ordinarily, I Go To The Woods Alone, With Not A Single Friend, For They Are All Smilers And Talkers And Therefore Unsuitable. I Don't Really Want To Be Witnessed Talking To The Catbirds Or Hugging The Old Black Oak Tree. I Have My Way Of Praying, As You No Doubt Have Yours. Besides, When I Am Alone I Can Become Invisible.

It Is No Use Thinking That Writing Of Poems - The Actual Writing - Can Accommodate Itself To A Social Setting, Even The Most Sympathetic Social Setting Of A Workshop Composed Of Friends. It Cannot. The Work Improves There And Often The Will To Work Gets Valuable Nourishment And Ideas. But, For Good Reasons, The Poem Requires Of The Writer Not Society Or Instruction, But A Patch Of Profound And Unbroken Solitude.

Look For Verbs Of Muscle, Adjectives Of Exactitude.

All Culture Developed As Some Wild, Raw Creature Strived To Live Better And Longer.

On The Beach, At Dawn: Four Small Stones Clearly Hugging Each Other. How Many Kinds Of Love Might There Be In The World, And How Many Formations Might They Make And Who Am I Ever To Imagine I Could Know Such A Marvelous Business? When The Sun Broke It Poured Willingly Its Light Over The Stones That Did Not Move, Not At All, Just As, To Its Always Generous Term, It Shed Its Light On Me, My Own Body That Loves, Equally, To Hug Another Body.

The Poet Must Not Only Write The Poem But Must Scrutinize The World Intensely, Or Anyway That Part Of The World He Or She Has Taken For Subject. If The Poem Is Thin, It Is Likely So Not Because The Poet Does Not Know Enough Words, But Because He Or She Has Not Stood Long Enough Among The Flowers--has Not Seen Them In Any Fresh, Exciting, And Valid Way.

The Poet Dreams Of The Classroom I Dreamed I Stood Up In Class And I Said Aloud: Teacher, Why Is Algebra Important? Sit Down, He Said. Then I Dreamed I Stood Up And I Said: Teacher, I’m Weary Of The Turkeys That We Have To Draw Every Fall. May I Draw A Fox Instead? Sit Down, He Said. Then I Dreamed I Stood Up Once More And Said: Teacher, My Heart Is Falling Asleep And It Wants To Wake Up. It Needs To Be Outside. Sit Down, He Said.

Language Is, In Other Words, Not Necessary, But Voluntary. If It Were Necessary, It Would Have Stayed Simple; It Would Not Agitate Our Hearts With Ever-present Loveliness And Ever-cresting Ambiguity; It Would Not Dream, On Its Long White Bones, Of Turning Into Song.

We Need Beauty Because It Makes Us Ache To Be Worthy Of It.

We Shake With Joy, We Shake With Grief. What A Time They Have, These Two Housed As They Are In The Same Body.

Sing, If You Can Sing, And It Not Still Be Musical Inside Yourself.

There Is A Notion That Creative People Are Absent-minded, Reckless, Heedless Of Social Customs And Obligations. It Is, Hopefully, True For They Are In Another World Altogether.

Far Off In The Red Mangroves An Alligator Has Heaved Himself Onto A Hummock Of Grass And Lies There, Studying His Poems.

Still, What I Want In My Life Is To Be Willing To Be Dazzled-to Cast Aside The Weight Of Facts And Maybe Even To Float A Little Above This Difficult World. I Want To Believe I Am Looking Into The White Fire Of A Great Mystery. I Want To Believe That The Imperfections Are Nothing-that The Light Is Everything-that It Is More Than The Sum Of Each Flawed Blossom Rising And Fading. And I Do.

Things Take The Time They Take. Don't Worry.

You Never Know / What Opportunity / Is Going To Travel To You, / Or Through You.

A Dog Can Never Tell You What She Knows From The Smells Of The World, But You Know, Watching Her, That You Know Almost Nothing.

When I Am Alone I Can Become Invisible. I Can Sit On The Top Of A Dune As Motionless As An Uprise Of Weeds, Until The Foxes Run By Unconcerned. I Can Hear The Almost Unhearable Sound Of The Roses Singing.

Tell Me, What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild And Precious Life?

I Believe In Kindness. Also In Mischief. Also In Singing, Especially When Singing Is Not Necessarily Prescribed.

You Are Young. So You Know Everything. You Leap Into The Boat And Begin Rowing. But, Listen To Me. Without Fanfare, Without Embarrassment, Without Doubt,i Talk Directly To Your Soul. Listen To Me.

Music: What So Many Sentences Aspire To Be.

I Went To India And Was Quite Taken With It. There's A Feeling There That Things Are Holy First And Useful Second. And In America, We Have It Backwards.

From The Complications Of Loving You I Think There Is No End Or Return. No Answer, No Coming Out Of It. Which Is The Only Way To Love, Isn't It? This Isn't A Playground, This Is Earth, Our Heaven, For A While. Therefore I Have Given Precedence To All My Sudden, Sullen, Dark Moods That Hold You In The Center Of My World. And I Say To My Body: Grow Thinner Still. And I Say To My Fingers, Type Me A Pretty Song. And I Say To My Heart: Rave On.

If You Have Ever Gone Into The Woods With Me, I Must Love You Very Much.

The Face Of The Moose Is As Sad As The Face Of Jesus.

Oh, To Love What Is Lovely, And Will Not Last! What A Task To Ask Of Anything, Or Anyone, Yet It Is Ours, And Not By The Century Or The Year, But By The Hours.

I Was Very Careful Never To Take An Interesting Job. If You Have An Interesting Job, You Get Interested In It.

Every Day I Walk Out Into The World / To Be Dazzled, Then To Be Reflective.

Belief Isn't Always Easy. But This Much I Have Learned--- If Not Enough Else--- To Live With My Eyes Open.

Poetry Is A Life-cherishing Force.

Do You Love This World? Do You Cherish Your Humble And Silky Life? Do You Adore The Green Grass, With Its Terror Beneath? Do You Also Hurry, Half-dressed And Barefoot, Into The Garden, And Softly, And Exclaiming Of Their Dearness, Fill Your Arms With The White And Pink Flowers, With Their Honeyed Heaviness, Their Lush Trembling, Their Eagerness To Be Wild And Perfect For A Moment, Before They Are Nothing, Forever?

Mornings At Blackwater" For Years, Every Morning, I Drank From Blackwater Pond. It Was Flavored With Oak Leaves And Also, No Doubt, The Feet Of Ducks. And Always It Assuaged Me From The Dry Bowl Of The Very Far Past. What I Want To Say Is That The Past Is The Past, And The Present Is What Your Life Is, And You Are Capable Of Choosing What That Will Be, Darling Citizen. So Come To The Pond, Or The River Of Your Imagination, Or The Harbor Of Your Longing, And Put Your Lips To The World. And Live Your Life.

People Want Poetry. They Need Poetry. They Get It. They Don't Want Fancy Work.

It's Morning, And Again I Am That Lucky Person Who Is In It.

After A Cruel Childhood, One Must Reinvent Oneself. Then Reimagine The World.

Who Knows What Will Happen Or Where I Will Be Sent, Yet Already I Have Given A Great Many Things Away, Expecting To Be Told To Pack Nothing, Except The Prayers Which, With This Thirst, I Am Slowly Learning.

I Believe Art Is Utterly Important. It Is One Of The Things That Could Save Us. We Don't Have To Rely Totally On Experience If We Can Do Things In Our Imagination.... It's The Only Way In Which You Can Live More Lives Than Your Own. You Can Escape Your Own Time, Your Own Sensibility, Your Own Narrowness Of Vision.

Instructions For Living A Life. Pay Attention. Be Astonished. Tell About It.

A Mind That Is Lively And Inquiring, Compassionate, Curious, Angry, Full Of Music, Full Of Feeling, Is A Mind Full Of Possible Poetry.

I Don't Want To End Up Simply Having Visited This World.

I Go Down To The Shore I Go Down To The Shore In The Morning And Depending On The Hour The Waves Are Rolling In Or Moving Out, And I Say, Oh, I Am Miserable, What Shall— What Should I Do? And The Sea Says In Its Lovely Voice: Excuse Me, I Have Work To Do.

The Language Of The Poem Is The Language Of Particulars.

It Is The Nature Of Stone To Be Satisfied. It Is The Nature Of Water To Want To Be Somewhere Else.

When Will You Have A Little Pity For Every Soft Thing That Walks Through The World, Yourself Included.

You Must Not Ever Stop Being Whimsical. And You Must Not, Ever, Give Anyone Else The Responsibility For Your Life.

A Dog Comes To You And Lives With You In Your Own House, But You Do Not Therefore Own Her, As You Do Not Own The Rain, Or The Trees, Or The Laws Which Pertain To Them ... A Dog Can Never Tell You What She Knows From The Smells Of The World, But You Know, Watching Her, That You Know Almost Nothing. . .

Be Good-natured And Untidy In Your Exuberance.

It Doesn't Have To Be The Blue Iris, It Could Be Weeds In A Vacant Lot, Or A Few Small Stones; Just Pay Attention, Then Patch A Few Words Together And Don't Try To Make Them Elaborate, This Isn't A Contest But The Doorway Into Thanks, And A Silence In Which Another Voice May Speak.

Poetry Is One Of The Original Arts, And It Began, As Did All The Fine Arts, Within The Original Wilderness Of The Earth.

The Three Ingredients Of Poetry: The Mystery Of The Universe, Spiritual Curiosity, The Energy Of Language.

And Over One More Set Of Hills, Along The Sea, The Last Roses Have Opened Their Factories Of Sweetness And Are Giving It Back To The World. If I Had Another Life I Would Want To Spend It All On Some Unstinting Happiness.

When Loneliness Comes Stalking, Go Into The Fields, Consider The Orderliness Of The World.

Sometimes I Need Only To Stand Wherever I Am To Be Blessed.

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.

Emerson, I Am Trying To Live, As You Said We Must, The Examined Life. But There Are Days I Wish There Was Less In My Head To Examine, Not To Speak Of The Busy Heart.

Look, I Want To Love This World As Though It's The Last Chance I'm Ever Going To Get To Be Alive And Know It.

This Is The First, Wildest, And Wisest Thing I Know, That The Soul Exists, And That It Is Built Entirely Out Of Attention.

Invention Hovers Always A Little Above The Rules.

Praying It Doesn’t Have To Be The Blue Iris, It Could Be Weeds In A Vacant Lot, Or A Few Small Stones; Just Pay Attention, Then Patch A Few Words Together And Don’t Try To Make Them Elaborate, This Isn’t A Contest But The Doorway Into Thanks, And A Silence In Which Another Voice May Speak.

I Feel The Terror Of Idleness, Like A Red Thirst. Death Isn't Just An Idea.

You May Not Agree, You May Not Care, But If You Are Holding This Book You Should Know That Of All The Sights I Love In This World — And There Are Plenty — Very Near The Top Of The List Is This One: Dogs Without Leashes.

One Day You Finally Knew What You Had To Do, And Began.

Poetry Isn't A Profession, It's A Way Of Life. It's An Empty Basket; You Put Your Life Into It And Make Something Out Of That.

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Francesca Annis

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