Entering In

"It doesn't have to be the blue iris.

It could be weeds and a vacant lot

or a few small stones.

Just pay attention

and 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." ~ Mary Oliver, Praying

Nothing Sweeter

"Nothing you ever understand will be sweeter,

or more binding,

than this deep affinity

between your eyes and the world." -Mary Oliver " Terns"

My Exercise

"Every day I walk out into the world to be dazzled,

then to be reflective."

-Mary Oliver, Long Afternoon at the Edge of Little Sister Pond

Discovery

Photo: N. Nyssen

"The stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice which you slowly recognized as your own." — Mary Oliver

Listening

"...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

I Believe In

"I believe in kindness.

Also in mischief.

Also in singing,

especially when singing is not necessarily prescribed." — Mary Oliver

"Alas for those who never sing, but die with their music still in them. "

-Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.

What Are You Doing For The Rest Of Your Life?

"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" -Mary Oliver

A Winter Day At My Favorite Beach

Laguna

"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.

It was what I was born for - to look, to listen, to lose myself
inside this soft world -

to instruct myself over and over in joy, and acclamation.



Nor am I talking about the exceptional, the fearful, the dreadful, the very
extravagant-

but of the ordinary,

the common,

the very drab,

the daily presentations.

A group of children were having an art lesson.

Oh, good scholar,

I say to myself,

how can you help but grow wise with such

teachings as these-

the untrimmable light of the world,

the oceans shine

the prayers that are made out of grass?" -Mary Oliver

Hillside flowers light up the hillsides with color.

Photos taken March 10, 2011

Hello

"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." — Mary Oliver

Unfolding Your Heart

Image: Georgia O'Keefe

"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." —Mary Oliver

To Be Filled With Light

"When I am among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness,

I would almost say that they save me,

and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,

in which I have goodness,

and discernment,

and never hurry through the world

but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves

and call out,

"Stay awhile."

The light flows from their branches.

And they call again,

"It's simple," they say,"

and you too have come

into the world to do this,

to go easy, to be filled

with light, and to shine."

-Mary Oliver, from Thirst

Made Out of Leaves

"Needing one, I invented her —

the great-great-aunt dark as hickory

called Shining-Leaf, or Drifting-Cloud

or The-Beauty-of-the-Night.

Dear aunt, I'd call into the leaves,

and she'd rise up, like an old log in a pool,

and whisper in a language only the two of us knew

the word that meant follow,

and we'd travel

cheerful as birds

out of the dusty town and into the trees

where she would change us both into something quicker —

two foxes with black feet,

two snakes green as ribbons,

two shimmering fish —

and all day we'd travel.

At day's end she'd leave me back at my own door

with the rest of my family,

who were kind, but solid as wood

and rarely wandered. While she,

old twist of feathers and birch bark,

would walk in circles wide as rain and then

float back

scattering the rags of twilight

on fluttering moth wings;

or she'd slouch from the barn like a gray opossum;

or she'd hang in the milky moonlight

burning like a medallion,

this bone dream, this friend I had to have,

this old woman made out of leaves."-Mary Oliver