Same Ol' Sky

Geese Passing By

The Swan
Across the wide waters
something comes
floating - a slim
and delicate

ship, filled
with white flowers--
and it moves
on its miraculous muscles

as though time didn't exist,
as though bringing such gifts
to the dry shore
was a happiness

almost beyond bearing.
And now it turns its dark eyes,
it rearranges
the clouds of its wings,

it trails
an elaborate webbed foot,
the color of charcoal.
Soon it will be here.

Oh what shall I do
when that poppy-colored beak
rests in my hand?
Said Mrs. Blake of the poet:

I miss my husband's company
he is so often
in paradise
Of course the path to heaven

doesn't lie down in flat miles.
It's in the imagination
with which you percieve
the world

and the gestures
with which you honor it
Oh, what will I do, what will I say, when those
white wings
touch the shore?

Mary Oliver

A Yard of Joy

Hummingbird Pauses at Trumpet Vine

Who doesn’t love
roses, and who
doesn’t love the lilies
of the black ponds

floating like flocks
of tiny swans,
and of course, the flaming
trumpet vine

where the hummingbird comes
like a small green angel, to soak
his dark tongue
in happiness -

and who doesn’t want
to live with the brisk
motor of his heart
singing

like a Schubert
and his eyes
working and working like those days of rapture,
by Van Gogh in Arles?

Look! for most of the world
is waiting
or remembering -
most of the world is time

when we’re not here,
not born yet, or died -
a slow fire
under the earth with all
our dumb wild blind cousins
who also
can’t even remember anymore
their own happiness -

Look! and then we will be
like the pale cool
stones, that last almost
forever.

Mary Oliver

The Lavender Hedge

White Flowers

Last night
in the fields
I lay down in the darkness
to think about death,
but instead I fell asleep,
as if in a vast and sloping room
filled with those white flowers
that open all summer,
sticky and untidy,
in the warm fields.
When I woke
the morning light was just slipping
in front of the stars,
and I was covered
with blossoms.
I don’t know
how it happened—
I don’t know
if my body went diving down
under the sugary vines
in some sleep-sharpened affinity
with the depths, or whether
that green energy
rose like a wave
and curled over me, claiming me
in its husky arms.
I pushed them away, but I didn’t rise.
Never in my life had I felt so plush,
or so slippery,
or so resplendently empty.
Never in my life
had I felt myself so near
that porous line
where my own body was done with
and the roots and the stems and the flowers
began.

Mary Oliver

He Seemed A Bit Confused...

I Know What I'm Looking For Now

Well, I got here early trying to decide
If there was nothing to hope for or nothing inside
But a mixed up girl with plenty to hide from the light of day.

Then a friend made me laugh, bought me a drink,
I walked in this garden and I started to think,
What little I know is quick as a wink but I’ve know a real long time.

I know what I’m looking for now. I know what I’m looking for now.
This world will mix you up, oh and bring you down.
I know what I’m looking for now.

Everyone’s looking, they’re not sure at what,
Holding onto illusions like it’s all that they got,
Putting a mystery where a mystery is not,
Can you tell me why?

When you can light up a stranger just passing by,
Start revolutions with the glint in your eye,
Sing Hallelujah with a breath or a sigh
And still know the way home.

I know what I’m looking for now. I know what I’m looking for now.
This world will mix you up, oh and bring you down.
I know what I’m looking for now.

All of these miles I’ve come,
All of these dreams I’ve chased in my mind,
All for something small and simple to find.

So you did what you could, you meant what you said,
You look like an angel so hold up your head,
A little lost here ain’t so bad.
That ain’t the reason to cry.

I know what I’m looking for now. I know what I’m looking for now.
This world will mix you up, oh and bring you down.
I know what I’m looking for now.

Tift Merritt

How a July Day Ends

Something To Me

The song I love the best’s the one my father taught to me,
The kindness of a stranger is dust from an unseen wing,
But an old friend at my table is by far the finest thing
This tired mile could give to me.
The colors of the man I love are deepest blue and green,
And it isn’t very often that I say just what I mean,
Cause the feeling seems to scatter and these words fall in between.
For what I miss I’ll just tell you this,

It’s something to me.
It’s something to me.
I don’t know what it comes to and it’s not so much to see,
But you take tomorrow so long as you know
It’s something to me,
It’s something to me.

Well, the city comes to greet me with her secrets all lit up,
Beauty is letting your guard down all the way in hands you trust,
But there’s a time you hold your head up, say it doesn’t hurt so much,
Keep all your tears where no one can see.
Gentle is the road within me and it’s gently I depart,
Cause these well-worn threads of daylight will sometimes come apart,
Giving way to all the shadows where no one can hear your heart,
So down in the dark, if that’s where you are,

It’s something to me.

Now the tender hands of morning have given up a new sunrise,
And we all get up together in our ordinary lives,
Going one step for another giving up has crossed my mind,
But I’ll take a long day, come round the right way.

Tift Merritt

Mt. Townsend

IX

I go by a field where once
I cultivated a few poor crops.
It is now covered with young trees,
for the forest that belongs here
has come back and reclaimed its own.
And think of all the effort
I have wasted and all the time,
and of how much joy I took
in that failed work and how much
it taught me. For in so failing
I learned something of my place,
something of myself, and now
I welcome back the trees.

Wendel Berry

The same three friends hiked up Mt. Townsend this summer. About 7 miles, I think, not sure, and the highest point is 6280 feet. I think we gained about 3000 feet. I was so tired the next day! But, it was fun and so was our room at The Waterstreet Hotel.