The Summer Day
Mary Oliver
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
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?
this was the poem garrison keiler read while i was driving home from work the other day (i love my new job at the spa by the way) maybe it was just the way he read it, but i love love loved it and now i'm sharing it.
4 comments:
It's wonderful. I think I'll memorize it.
What, I ask you, is wrong with my subscription! Here you've been writing all summer and I just got notice now. The same happens with Geo's blog. Random notifications every few months. Arr!
But I lOVE this poem. Rob showed me how to hold praying mantises this summer. I was too scared before. Of course, they don't eat sugar; they eat husbands.
Oooh...what a great poem. I especially love that last question in the last two lines. Lovely. Thanks for sharing it.
MMMM...was that writer's almanac? That's what I listen to on my way TO work and Mr. Keillor's soothing voice prepares me to meet my public. Great poem! Hugs across the ocean...JM
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