August 6: "At Round Pond," the Immediate, Wendell Berry

Mary Oliver meditates on death and owls . . . 

At Round Pond

by:  Mary Oliver

owl

make your little appearance now

owl dark bird bird of gloom

messenger reminder

of death

that can't be stopped

argued with leashed put out

like a red fire but

burns as it will

owl

I have not seen you now for

too long a time don't

hide away but come flowing and clacking

the slap of your wings

your death's head oh rise

out of the thick and shaggy pines when you

look down with your

golden eyes how everything 

trembles

then settles

from mere incidence into

the lush of meaning

I've never really thought of an owl as a harbinger of death.  Dark bird.  Bird of gloom.  Of course, Oliver doesn't dread the appearance of the owl.  Nope.  In fact, she seems to be missing the owl's presence in her life.  She summons the owl out of the thick and shaggy pines to transform the world into something beyond the immediate.  Into extravagant meaning.

So much of my days are taken up by the immediate, as with most adults.  It's difficult to think deeply about anything when there's laundry to fold, grocery shopping to do, papers to grade, or dogs to walk.  Most of my serious philosophizing about the meaning of life comes either early morning when I haven't yet dipped my toes into the pool of the day or late night when all I can think about is cold pillows and bad television.  I honestly believe that, if Plato were alive today, he'd probably be working at McDonald's without a whole lot of people caring about his stupid cave.

Tonight, I led a virtual poetry workshop in celebration of poet Wendell Berry's 89th birthday.  Now, if there's one thing I've learned it's that Berry despises the immediacy of the modern world.  Facebook.  Instagram.  Twitter/X.  All of these things are anathema to him.  If I'm not mistaken, Berry still works on a manual typewriter and lives on a 50-acre Kentucky farm that he purchased in 1965.  He's never owned a computer or cell phone, and he's become a kind of prophet of environmental stewardship.

Preparing for my Wendell Berry workshop, I spent a lot of time reading his poems and essays.  Living with him, in a way.  I admire the integrity of his existence.  His refusal to compromise with the 21st century's technology and life.  I don't think I could ever follow his example, but I celebrate that people like him exist.  He's like John the Baptist calling out from the desert for everyone to prepare ye the way.  

It's late now.  I'm tired and trying to keep at bay the worries of the coming week.  The owl is stalking my thoughts, ready to swoop down and pounce on them like field mice.  Of course, I'm typing this blog post on my laptop, and, as soon as I'm done editing, I will publish it on the internet.  There's immediacy for you.  Instant gratification.  Wendell Berry would hate it.

Mary Oliver and Wendell Berry have a lot in common.  They both embrace the peace of wild things.  As far as I can tell, they didn't really know each other or meet.  But, in my mind, I see them wandering through a field at night, listening to the great bird of gloom hooting from the shaggy pines.

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

Wendell answers, "Love is what carries you, for it is always there, even in the dark, or most in the dark, but shining out at times like gold stitches in a piece of embroidery."

And the owl adds, "Who, who, who is hoping his one wild and precious life is stitched with gold tomorrow?"

Saint Marty, that's who.

Image courtesy of felt artist Jody Trost

December 6: Blind Inn-Keeper's Stable, Cynical and Hardened, a Reminder

Billy Pilgrim was meanwhile traveling back to Dresden, too, but not in the present.  He was going back there in 1945, two days after the city was destroyed.  Now Billy and the rest were being marched into the ruins by their guards.  I was there.  O'Hare was there.  We had spent the past two nights in the blind inn-keeper's stable.  Authorities had found us there.  They told us what to do.  We were to borrow picks and shovels and crowbars and wheelbarrows from our neighbors.  We were to march with these implements to such and such a place in the ruins, ready to go to work.

This passage is a strange mixture of fiction and memoir.  Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut's time-traveling hero, is present.  Vonnegut is present, as well, along with his war buddy, O'Hare.  All three have spent a couple days in the stable of the blind inn-keeper (a little Christmas echo, there).  Now, the Germans are putting their prisoners to work in the ruins of Dresden.  This passage doesn't say it, but they are going to be searching for bodies in the wreckage of the city, something that Vonnegut did for quite some time before the end of the war.  So it goes.

First, allow me to apologize for my blog absence yesterday.  It was my daughter's 17th birthday.  Last night, I hosted a benefit at a local library.  Many of my university writing colleagues and I read some of our work and collected canned goods and nonperishable food items for local food pantries.  We had a crowd of nearly 100 people and collected, you guessed it, nearly 100 food items.  It was a wonderful night of good words, good laughter, and good works.

You know, it's really easy to become cynical and hardened right now in the United States.  There's a lot of terrible things happening on local, state, and national levels.  Accused pedophiles running for public office, with the endorsement of the President of the United States.  Nazis marching in the streets, with not one serious word of condemnation from the current President of the United States.  A new tax plan that will take away health care from children, cut funds to public schools, and provide millions of dollars in tax breaks to the incredibly wealthy, including (you guessed it!) the President of the United States.

Vonnegut and Billy and O'Hare face horrifying things in Dresden.  Vonnegut and O'Hare spent weeks searching and digging for human remains in the rubble.  I can't imagine doing what they did and not being forever changed.  I like to think that I have a strong faith in God, but, if I had to go through what Vonnegut did, I'm not sure that my faith would have carried me through.

It's easy to turn your back on God when confronted by God-less acts of violence and cruelty.  Since the current President of the United States took the oath of office in January, I have found my faith sorely tested.  It's really difficult to see rich white men and women, who claim to be Christians, taking away so much from the poor and needy.  I believe, if John the Baptist were around today, he'd be calling out a lot of viper broods.  There's just so much hypocrisy with government "servants."  It seems, to me, that the servants of the government are making the government serve them.

So, I needed last night to restore my faith in humanity a little bit.  To remind me that there are more good people than bad in the world.  The library was full of good people yesterday evening, doing a very good thing.

Saint Marty is thankful for that reminder.