111 Quotes & Sayings By Mary Oliver

Why I Wake Early Hello, sun in my face. Hello, you who made the morningand spread it over the fieldsand into the faces of the tulipsand the nodding morning glories, and into the windows of, even, themiserable and the crotchety — best preacher that ever was, dear star, that just happensto be where you are in the universeto 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 dayin happiness, in kindness. Mary Oliver

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 wonderif 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. Mary Oliver

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 wasalive for a little while. Mary Oliver

Last nightthe rainspoke to meslowly, saying, what joyto come fallingout of the brisk cloud, to be happy againin a new wayon the earth! That’s what it saidas it dropped, smelling of iron, and vanishedlike a dream of the oceaninto the branchesand the grass below. Then it was over. The sky cleared. I was standingunder a tree. The tree was a treewith happy leaves, and I was myself, and there were stars in the skythat were also themselvesat the momentat which momentmy right handwas holding my left handwhich was holding the treewhich was filled with starsand the soft rain —imagine! imagine! the long and wondrous journeysstill to be ours. Mary Oliver

I learned from Whitman that the poem is a temple -- or a green field -- a place to enter, and in which to feel. Only in a secondary way is it an intellectual thing -- an artifact, a moment of seemly and robust wordiness --wonderful as that part of it is. I learned that the poem was made not just to exist, but to speak --to be company. It was everything that was needed, when everything was needed. . Mary Oliver

Percy wakes me (fourteen)Percy wakes me and I am not ready. He has slept all night under the covers. Now he’s eager for action: a walk, then breakfast. So I hasten up. He is sitting on the kitchen counter Where he is not supposed to be. How wonderful you are, I say. How clever, if you Needed me, To wake me. He thought he would a lecture and deeply His eyes begin to shine. He tumbles onto the couch for more compliments. He squirms and squeals: he has done something That he needed And now he hears that it is okay. I scratch his ears. I turn him over And touch him everywhere. He is Wild with the okayness of it. Then we walk, then He has breakfast, and he is happy. This is a poem about Percy.This is a poem about more than Percy.Think about it. Mary Oliver

Oxygen Everything needs it: bone, muscles, and even, while it calls the earth its home, the soul. So the merciful, noisy machine stands in our house working away in its lung-like voice. I hear it as I kneel before the fire, stirring with a stick of iron, letting the logs lie more loosely. You, in the upstairs room, are in your usual position, leaning on your right shoulder which aches all day. You are breathing patiently; it is a beautiful sound. It is your life, which is so close to my own that I would not know where to drop the knife of separation. And what does this have to do with love, except everything? Now the fire rises and offers a dozen, singing, deep-red roses of flame. Then it settles to quietude, or maybe gratitude, as it feeds as we all do, as we must, upon the invisible gift: our purest, sweet necessity: the air. Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your kneesfor 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 rainare 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 placein the family of things. Mary Oliver

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. (Don't Hesitate) . Mary Oliver

Sometimes I dreamthat 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. Mary Oliver

Look, the treesare turningtheir own bodiesinto pillarsof light, are giving off the richfragrance of cinnamonand fulfillment, the long tapersof cattailsare bursting and floating away overthe blue shouldersof the ponds, and every pond, no matter what itsname is, isnameless now. Every yeareverything I have ever learnedin my lifetimeleads back to this: the firesand the black river of losswhose other sideis salvation, whose meaningnone of us will ever know. To live in this worldyou must be ableto do three things:to love what is mortal;to hold itagainst your bones knowingyour own life depends on it;and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go. Mary Oliver

I wanted the past to go away, I wantedto leave it, like another country; I wantedmy life to close, and openlike a hinge, like a wing, like the part of the songwhere it fallsdown over the rocks: an explosion, a discovery; I wantedto hurry into the work of my life; I wanted to know, whoever I was, I wasalivefor a little while. Mary Oliver

Still, what I want in my lifeis to be willingto be dazzled–to cast aside the weight of factsand maybe evento float a littleabove this difficult world. I want to believe I am lookinginto 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 sumof each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do. Mary Oliver

Poem (the spirit likes to dress up) The spirit likes to dress up like this: ten fingers, ten toes, shoulders, and all the rest at night in the black branches, in the morningin the blue branches of the world. It could float, of course, but would ratherplumb rough matter. Airy and shapeless thing, it needs the metaphor of the body, lime and appetite, the oceanic fluids; it needs the body’s world, instinctand imagination and the dark hug of time, sweetness and tangibility, to be understood, to be more than pure light that burns where no one is —so it enters us — in the morning shines from brute comfort like a stitch of lightning;and at night lights up the deep and wondrous drownings of the body like a star. Mary Oliver

And then I feel the sun itselfas it blazes over the hills, like a million flowers on fire --clearly I'm not needed, yet I feel myself turninginto something of inexplicable value.-from The Buddha's Last Instruction Mary Oliver

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 moonor the slipper of its coming back. Or, a kiss. Well, yes, especially a kiss. Mary Oliver

DogfishI 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.…mostly, I want to be kind. And nobody, of course, is kind, Or mean, For a simple reason. And nobody gets out of it, having to Swim through the fires to stay in This world. Mary Oliver

I went down not long agoto the Mad River, under the willows I knelt and drank from that crumpled flow, call itwhat madness you will, there's a sicknessworse than the risk of death and that'sforgetting what we should never forget. Tecumseh lived here. The wounds of the pastare ignored, but hang onlike the litter that snags among the yellow branches, newspapers and plastic bags, after the rains. Where are the Shawnee now? Do you know? Or would you have to write to Washington, and even then, whatever they said, would you believe it? SometimesI would like to paint my body red and go intothe glittering snowto die. His name meant Shooting Star.From Mad River country north to the borderhe gathered the tribesand armed them one more time. He vowedto keep Ohio and it took himover twenty years to fail. After the bloody and final fighting, at Thames, it was over, excepthis body could not be found, and you can do whatever you want with that, sayhis people came in the black leaves of the nightand hauled him to a secret grave, or thathe turned into a little boy again, and leapedinto a birch canoe and wentrowing home down the rivers. Anywaythis much I'm sure of: if we meet him, we'll know it, he will still beso angry. Mary Oliver

The poet dreams of the mountain Sometimes I grow weary of the days, with all their fits and starts. I want to climb some old gray mountains, slowly, taking The rest of my lifetime to do it, resting often, sleeping Under the pines or, above them, on the unclothed rocks. I want to see how many stars are still in the sky That we have smothered for years now, a century at least. I want to look back at everything, forgiving it all, And peaceful, knowing the last thing there is to know. All that urgency! Not what the earth is about! How silent the trees, their poetry being of themselves only. I want to take slow steps, and think appropriate thoughts. In ten thousand years, maybe, a piece of the mountain will fall. . Mary Oliver

The sweetness of dogs (fifteen) What do you say, Percy? I am thinkingof sitting out on the sand to watchthe moon rise. Full tonight. So we goand the moon rises, so beautiful it makes me shudder, makes me think abouttime and space, makes me takemeasure of myself: one iotapondering heaven. Thus we sit, I thinking how grateful I am for the moon’s perfect beauty and also, oh! How richit is to love the world. Percy, meanwhile, leans against me and gazes up intomy face. As though I werehis perfect moon. Mary Oliver

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. Mary Oliver

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?. Mary Oliver

How heron comes It is a negligence of the mindnot to notice how at duskheron comes to the pond andstands there in his death robes, perfectservant of the system, hungry, his eyesfull of attention, his wingspure light Mary Oliver

Tom Dancer’s gift of a whitebark pine cone You never know What opportunity Is going to travel to you, Or through you. Once a friend gave me A small pine cone- One of a few He found in the scat Of a grizzly In Utah maybe, Or Wyoming. I took it home And did what I supposed He was sure I would do- I ate it, ThinkingHow it had traveled Through that rough And holy body. It was crisp and sweet. It was almost a prayer Without words. My gratitude, Tom Dancer, For this gift of the world I adore so much And want to belong to. And thank you too, great bear . Mary Oliver

There are things you can’t reach. ButYou can reach out to them, and all day long. The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of god. And it can keep you busy as anything else, and happier. I look; morning to night I am never done with looking. Looking I mean not just standing around, but standing around As though with your arms open. Mary Oliver

Intellectual work sometimes, spiritual work certainly, artistic work always – these are forces that fall within its grasp, forces that must travel beyond the realm of the hour and the restraint of the habit. Nor can the actual work be well separated from the entire life. Like the knights of the Middle Ages, there is little the creatively inclined person can do but to prepare himself, body and spirit, for the labor to come – for his adventures are all unknown. In truth, the work itself is the adventure. And no artist could go about this work, or would want to, with less than extraordinary energy and concentration. The extraordinary is what art is about. Mary Oliver

Every spring I hear the thrush singingin the glowing woodshe is only passing through. His voice is deep, then he lifts it until it seemsto fall from the sky. I am thrilled. I am grateful. Then, by the end of morning, he's gone, nothing but silenceout of the treewhere 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 Mahlerevery day, all day. It would exhaust anyone. . Mary Oliver

I stood like Adam in his lonely garden On that first morning, shaken out of sleep, Rubbing his eyes, listening, parting the leaves, Like tissue on some vast, incredible gift. Mary Oliver

I could not be a poet without the natural world. Someone else could. But not me. For me the door to the woods is the door to the temple. Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your kneesfor a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Mary Oliver

Wild GeeseYou do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your kneesfor 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 rainare 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 placein the family of things. Mary Oliver

A carpenter is hired- a roof repaired, a porch built. Everything that can be fixed. June, July, August. Everyday we hear their laughter. I think of the painting by van Gogh, the man in the chair. Everything wrong, and nowhere to go. His hands over his eyes. Mary Oliver

And now you'll be telling storiesof my coming backand they won't be false, and they won't be truebut they'll be real Mary Oliver

That time I thought I could notgo any closer to griefwithout dying I went closer, and I did not die. Surely Godhad his hand in this, as well as friends. Still, I was bent, and my laughter, as the poet said, was nowhere to be found. Then said my friend Daniel, (brave even among lions), “ It’s not the weight you carrybut how you carry it -books, bricks, grief -it’s all in the wayyou embrace it, balance it, carry itwhen you cannot, and would not, put it down.” So I went practicing. Have you noticed? Have you heardthe laughterthat comes, now and again, out of my startled mouth? How I lingerto admire, admire, admirethe things of this worldthat are kind, and maybealso troubled -roses in the wind, the sea geese on the steep waves, a loveto which there is no reply? . Mary Oliver

The Fourth Sign of The Zodiac (Part 3) by Mary OliverI know, you never intended to be in this world. But you’re in it all the same. So why not get started immediately. I mean, belonging to it. There is so much to admire, to weep over. And to write music or poems about. Bless the feet that take you to and fro. Bless the eyes and the listening ears. Bless the tongue, the marvel of taste. Bless touching. You could live a hundred years, it’s happened. Or not. I am speaking from the fortunate platformof many years, none of which, I think, I ever wasted. Do you need a prod? Do you need a little darkness to get you going? Let me be as urgent as a knife, then, and remind you of Keats, so single of purpose and thinking, for a while, he had a lifetime. Mary oliver . Mary Oliver

Oh Lord of melons, of mercy, though I am not ready, nor worthy, I am climbing towards you. Mary Oliver

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. Mary Oliver

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. Mary Oliver

No, I mean really listen. Here's a story, and you don't have to visit manyhouses to find it. One person is talking, the other one is not really listening.someone can look like they are but they'reactually thinking about something they want to say, or their minds are justwandering. Or they're looking at thatlittle box people hold in their hands thesedays. And people get discouraged, so theyquit trying. And the very quiet people, you may have noticed, are often the sadpeople. Mary Oliver

I believe you did not have a happy life. I believe you were cheated. I believe your best friends were loneliness and misery. I believe your busiest enemies were anger and depression. I believe joy was a game you could never play without stumbling. I believe comfort, though you craved it, was forever a stranger. I believe music had to be melancholy or not at all. I believe no trinket, no precious metal, shone so bright as your bitterness. I believe you lay down at last in your coffin none the wiser and unassuaged. Oh, cold and dreamless under the wild, amoral, reckless, peaceful flowers of the hillsides. . Mary Oliver

Imagination is better than a sharp instrument. To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work. Mary Oliver

Of course! the path to heavendoesn't lie down in flat miles. It's in the imaginationwith which you perceive this world, and the gestureswith which you honor it.-from The Swan Mary Oliver

It's very important to write things down instantly, or you can lose the way you were thinking out a line. I have a rule that if I wake up at 3 in the morning and think of something, I write it down. I can't wait until morning -- it'll be Mary Oliver

After a cruel childhood, one must reinvent oneself. Then reimagine the world. Mary Oliver

DAISIESIt is possible, I suppose that sometimewe will learn everythingthere is to learn: what the world is, for example, and what it means. I think this as I am crossingfrom one field to another, in summer, and themockingbird is mocking me, as one who eitherknows enough already or knows enough to beperfectly content not knowing. Song being bornof quest he knows this: he must turn silentwere he suddenly assaulted with answers. Insteadoh hear his wild, caustic, tender warbling ceaselesslyunanswered. At my feet the white-petalled daisies displaythe small suns of their center piece, their -- if you don'tmind my saying so -- their hearts. Of course I could be wrong, perhaps their hearts are pale andnarrow and hidden in the roots. What do I know? But this: it is heaven itself to take what is given, to see what is plain; what the sun lights up willingly;for example -- I think thisas I reach down, not to pick but merely to touch --the suitability of the field for the daisies, and thedaisies for the field. . Mary Oliver

I learned from Whitman that the poem is a temple--or a green field--a place to enter, and in which to feel. Mary Oliver

Language is rich, and malleable. It is a living, vibrant material, and every part of a poem works in conjunction with every other part - the content, the place, the diction, the rhythm, the tone-as well as the very sliding, floating, thumping, rapping sounds of it. Mary Oliver

Listen, whatever you see and love–that’s where you are. Mary Oliver

I mean, by such flightiness, something that feels unsatisfied at the center of my life – that makes me shaky, fickle, inquisitive, and hungry. I could call it a longing for home and not be far wrong. Or I could call it a longing for whatever supersedes, if it cannot pass through, understanding. Other words that come to mind: faith, grace, rest. In my outward appearance and life habits I hardly change – there’s never been a day that my friends haven’t been able to say, and at a distance, “There’s Oliver, still standing around in the weeds. There she is, still scribbling in her notebook.” But, at the center: I am shaking; I am flashing like tinsel. Restless. I read about ideas. Yet I let them remain ideas. I read about the poet who threw his books away, the better to come to a spiritual completion. Yet I keep my books. I flutter; I am attentive, maybe I even rise a little, balancing; then I fall back. Mary Oliver

I would like people to remember of me, howinexhaustible was her mindfulness. Mary Oliver

It's not a competition, it's a doorway. Mary Oliver

To interrupt the writer from the line of thought is to wake the dreamer from the dream. The dreamer cannot enter that dream, precisely as it was unfolding, ever again. Mary Oliver

Be prepared. A dog is adorable and noble. A dog is a true and loving friend. A dogis also a hedonist. Mary Oliver

But I want to extol not the sweetness nor the placidity of the dog, but the wilderness out of which he cannot step entirely, and from which we benefit. For wilderness is our first home too, and in our wild ride into modernity with all its concerns and problems we need also all the good attachments to that origin that we can keep or restore. Dog is one of the messengers of that rich and still magical first world. The dog would remind us of the pleasures of the body with its graceful physicality, and the acuity and rapture of the senses, and the beauty of forest and ocean and rain and our own breath. There is not a dog that romps and runs but we learn from him. The other dog–the one that all its life walks leashed and obedient down the sidewalk–is what a chair is to a tree. It is a possession only, the ornament of a human life. Such dogs can remind us of nothing large or noble or mysterious or lost. They cannot make us sweeter or more kind. Only unleashed dogs can do that. They are a kind of poetry themselves when they are devoted not only to us but to the wet night, to the moon and the rabbit-smell in the grass and their own bodies leaping forward. Mary Oliver

EVERY DOG’S STORYI have a bed, my very own. It’s just my size. And sometimes I like to sleep alonewith dreams inside my eyes. But sometimes dreams are dark and wild and creepyand I wake and am afraid, though I don’t know why. But I’m no longer sleepyand too slowly the hours go by. So I climb on the bed where the light of the moonis shining on your faceand I know it will be morning soon. Everybody needs a safe place. . Mary Oliver

But very little of it can do morethan start you on your way to the real, unimaginablydifficult goal of writing memorably. That work is doneslowly and in solitude, and it is as improbable as carryingwater in a sieve. Mary Oliver

Athletes take care of their bodies. Writers must similarly take care of the sensibility that houses the possibility of poems. There is nourishment in books, other art, history, philosophies–in holiness and in mirth. It is in honest hands-on labor also; I don't mean to indicatea preference for the scholarly life. And it is in the green world–among people, and animals, and trees for that matter, if one genuinely cares about trees. Mary Oliver

Look, hasn't my body already felt like the body of a flower? Mary Oliver

MYSTERIES, YES 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. How two hands touch and the bonds will never be broken. How people come, from delight or the scars of damage, to the comfort of a poem. 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. . Mary Oliver

Love, love, love, says Percy.And hurry as fast as you canalong the shining beach, or the rubble, or the dust. Then, go to sleep. Give up your body heat, your beating heart. Then, trust. Mary Oliver

LITTLE DOGS RHAPSODY IN THE NIGHT(PERCY THREE)He puts his cheek against mineand makes small, expressive sounds. And when I'm awake, or awake enoughhe turns upside down, his four pawsin the airand his eyes dark and fervent. Tell me you love me, he says. Tell me again. Could there be a sweeter arrangement? Over and overhe gets to ask it. I get to tell. Mary Oliver

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... Mary Oliver

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? Mary Oliver

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. Mary Oliver

It does no good to bark at the television, I said. I’ve tried it too. So he stopped. Mary Oliver

The man who has many answersis often foundin the theaters of informationwhere he offers, graciously, his deep findings. While the man who has only questions, to comfort himself, makes music. Mary Oliver

The Pond"August of another summer, and once again I am drinking the sunand the lilies again are spread across the water. I know now what they want is to touch each other. I have not been here for many yearsduring which time I kept living my life. Like the heron, who can only croak, who wishes he could sing, I wish I could sing. A little thanks from every throat would be appropriate. This is how it has been, and this is how it is: All my life I have been able to feel happiness, except whatever was not happiness, which I also remember. Each of us wears a shadow. But just now it is summer againand I am watching the lilies bow to each other, then slide on the wind and the tug of desire, close, close to one another, Soon now, I'll turn and start for home. And who knows, maybe I'll be singing. Mary Oliver

Come with me into the woods where spring isadvancing, as it does, no matter what, not being singular or particular, but oneof the forever gifts, and certainly visible. Mary Oliver

Do you think the wren ever dreams of a better house? Mary Oliver

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. Mary Oliver

Winter walks up and down the town swinging his censer, but no smoke or sweetness comes from it, only the sour, metallic frankness of salt and snow. Mary Oliver

This morning the green fists of the peonies are getting readyto break my heartas the sun rises, as the sun strokes them with his old, buttery fingersand they open –pools of lace, white and pink –and all day the black ants climb over them, boring their deep and mysterious holesinto the curls, craving the sweet sap, taking it awayto their dark, underground cities –and all dayunder the shifty wind, as in a dance to the great wedding, the flowers bend their bright bodies, and tip their fragrance to the air, and rise, their red stems holdingall that dampness and recklessness gladly and lightly, and there it is again – beauty the brave, the exemplary, blazing open. 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 eagernessto be wild and perfect for a moment, before they arenothing, forever? . Mary Oliver

When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it’s over, I don’t want to wonderif I have made of my life something particular, and real. I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightenedor full of argument. I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world. Mary Oliver

This is what I have. The dull hangover of waiting, the blush of my heart on the damp grass, the flower-faced moon. A gull broods on the shore where a moment ago there were two. Softly my right hand fondles my left hand as though it were you. Mary Oliver

All night my heart makes its wayhowever it can over the rough groundof uncertainties, but only until nightmeets and then is overwhelmed bymorning, the light deepening, thewind easing and just waiting, as Itoo wait (and when have I ever beendisappointed?) for redbird to sing Mary Oliver

Sometimes breaking the rules is just extending the rules Mary Oliver

Why should I have been surprised? Hunters walk the forestwithout a sound. The hunter, strapped to his rifle, the fox on his feet of silk, the serpent on his empire of muscles–all move in a stillness, hungry, careful, intent. Just as the cancerentered the forest of my body, without a sound. Mary Oliver

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 love the dog of our own life, and the dog down the street, and all the dogs not yet born. Mary Oliver

To live in this world, you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go. Mary Oliver