September 1: "The Egret," Disengaged, Falling Apples

Mary Oliver does some bird watching . . . 

The Egret

by:  Mary Oliver

Every time                                    and the white scrolls

but one                                          of her belly, 

the little fish                                 and the white flame

and the green                                of her head.

and spotted frogs                          What more can you say

know                                             about such wild swimmers?

the egret's bamboo legs                They were here,

from the thin                                 they were silent,

and polished reeds                        they are gone, having tasted

at the edge                                    sheer terror.

of the silky world                         Therefore I have invented words

of water.                                       with which to stand back

Then,                                            on the weedy shore--

in their last inch of time               with which to say:

they see,                                       Look!  Look!

for an instant,                               What is this dark death

the white froth                             that opens

of her shoulders                           like a white door?

Oliver is a master at finding profound meaning in tiny moments.  The tiny moment in question this time is an egret feeding on fish and frogs in the shallows of a pond.  In Oliver's hands/words, this moment becomes a meditation on terror and death.  I can almost hear the echo of Matthew 24:  "Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect."  

The egret is coming at an hour you do not expect.

I took today off work.  Not only that, I also took a two-hour nap this afternoon.  As most of my faithful disciples know, I don't frequently have "free" time (is time ever free?).  I purposely didn't respond to texts, didn't check emails, and only answered phone calls and messages from close family and friends.  To use a buzzword that I sort of loathe, I completely disengaged.

Now, I didn't simply sit on my couch and ignore the world, obviously.  I had dinner and watched a movie with my kids.  Went for a couple walks with my puppy.  Edited and released an episode of my podcast Lit for Christmas.  Now, I'm writing my daily blog post.  So, disengagement is a relative thing, I suppose.  Basically, I only did things that I wanted to do.  Things that gave me pleasure and satisfaction.

This year, I've been starting every one of my days the same way:  I read a Mary Oliver poem.  This morning, it was "The Egret."  This ritual allows me to meditate on the poem du jour for a good length of time, to help me find my Mary moment, even when I'm trying to avoid my normal stresses and struggles.

Today, I found myself thinking about something my sister, Sally, taught me.  At the end of my life, I'm never going to say to myself, "I wish I'd spent more time working."  Nope.  Work shouldn't be what defines me.  When I'm gone, I hope people will remember me as a loving and devoted husband, father, brother, son, and friend.  That's what's truly important.  Sally was a workaholic, and she died at a very young age without getting the chance to retire and enjoy her golden years, if golden years even exist.  So, her message seems even more cautionary and urgent now.

It was the first day of September.  Blue and brilliant and warm.  On one of my walks, I saw that my neighbor's apple tree was dropping its fruit.  Autumn is around the corner, and, especially in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, winter  is coming at an hour we do not expect.

So, I took advantage of today.  Rested.  Ate with my wife, son, and daughter.  Read some poetry.  Exercised.  Wrote.  Because the apples are falling, the egret is in the shallows, and winter will soon be breathing frost down our necks.

Saint Marty is now going to disengage from this post.

August 29: "Water Snake," Book of Genesis, Bob Ross

Mary Oliver encounters a serpent . . .

Water Snake

by:  Mary Oliver

I saw him

in a dry place

on a hot day,

a traveler

making his way

from one pond

to another,

and he lifted up

his chary face

and looked at me

with his gravel eyes,

and the feather of his tongue

shot in and out

of his otherwise clamped mouth,

and I stopped on the path

to give him room,

and he went past me

with his head high,

loathing me, I think,

for my long legs,

my poor body, like a post,

my many fingers,

for he didn't linger

but, touching the other side of the path,

he headed, in long lunges and quick heaves,

straight to the nearest basin

of sweet black water and weeds,

and solitude--

like an old sword

that suddenly picked itself up and went off,

swinging, swinging

through the green leaves.

Oliver doesn't seem to be afraid of the snake.  She gives it wide berth, but there is also a certain admiration in the way she describes its gravel eyes and feather tongue.  There's beauty in its lunges and heaves as it searches for black water.  It makes me think of the serpent in the Biblical book of Genesis, cunning and charismatic enough to convince Eve and Adam to eat the fruit.

Think about it.  If the serpent in Genesis was frightening or repulsive in any way, Eve probably wouldn't have listened to it, and we would all be skinny dipping in the Garden of Eden right now.  Instead, Eve lets the forked feather of its tongue lead her astray, and the rest, as they say, is history, if you're literal-minded, or myth, if you're a poet.

Of course, I'm a poet.  I'm supposed to spend my days looking for moments of beauty and peace and grace.  However, it doesn't always work that way for me.  Most days, I'm too busy or tired to go hunting for wonder.  Today, for instance, I taught at the university and hosted a blues concert at the library in the evening.  The musicians were friends of mine, and their music, a wonderful gift.  

On my way home, I stopped at a grocery store to purchase some Diet Coke and snacks for my son.

As I was walking into the store with my wife, I looked up into the sky.  Most of the day had been dreary and cold, with lots of gray clouds and mist.  Tonight, the clouds were dusted pink, as if the ghost of Bob Ross had brushed them with a little Alizarin Crimson and Titanium White to make them happier.  More than likely, it was simply the setting sun causing the effect, but I like to imagine Bob Ross as God with an afro, making the whole universe and everything in it just a little happier.

That was my Mary moment today.  A sky gilded with color.

Anything can be beautiful, as long as you have the right paints and attitude.

Saint Marty gives thanks for snakes and Bob Ross tonight.

August 27: "Goldfinches," Book Club, End of Summer

Mary Oliver loves her some . . . 

Goldfinches

by:  Mary Oliver

In the fields

we let them have--

in the fields

we don't want yet--

where thistles rise

out of the marshlands of spring and spring open--

each bud

a settlement of riches--

a coin of reddish fire--

the finches

wait for midsummer,

for the long days,

for the brass heat,

for the seeds to begin to form in the hardening thistles,

dazzling as the teeth of mice,

but black,

filling the face of every flower.

Then they drop from the sky.

A buttery gold,

they swing on the thistles, they gather

the silvery down, they carry it

in their finchy beaks

to the edges of the fields,

to the trees,

as though their minds were on fire

with the flower of one perfect idea--

and there they build their nests

and lay their pale-blue eggs,

every year,

and every year

the hatchlings wake in the swaying branches

in the silver baskets,

and love the world.

Is it necessary to say any more?

Have you heard them singing in the wind, above the final fields?

Have you ever been so happy in your life?

Spying a goldfinch in a field or at the edge of a field or in a tree is not unusual.  They are pretty ordinary birds, with their buttery gold feathers and po-ta-to-chip flight calls.  Of course, Oliver finds them miraculous, a source of peace and joy.

This evening, I went for a walk with my puppy.  The sun was well on its downward descent, and the air had a chill to it, even though it's still August.  (My furnace kicked in twice this morning.)  On my walk, I saw this tree full of light--green gilded gold.  I took a picture of it, but the picture simply doesn't capture how dazzlingly beautiful it was.  It was a goldfinch of a tree.  Ordinary but extraordinary.

It feels like the end of summer this evening.  Tomorrow, the fall semester kicks off at the university, so I spent most of this afternoon and evening pulling my syllabi together and updating my online course content.  If that sounds exotic or exciting, it isn't.  It's tedious work where I sit with my textbook on one side and calendar on the other, trying to plan out an entire semester for the two classes I'm teaching.  

I'm bushed.  All of last week was exhausting, from start to finish.  I can feel tiredness in my bones.  I did meet with my book club tonight to talk about Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead and eat dinner.  Some of my oldest and closest friends are members, so the discussion usually veers from reminiscence to literary discussion and back.  It was a lovely break from the drudgery of the rest of the day with people I love dearly.

However, I did see a tree on fire with gold tonight.  And it made me happy.  Because the tree seemed just as unwilling as me to let go of summer.

That was Saint Marty's Mary moment today.

August 1: "One Hundred White-Sided Dolphins on a Summer Day," Long Day, In the World

Mary Oliver admires . . . 

One Hundred White-Sided Dolphins

on a Summer Day

by:  Mary Oliver

1.

Fat,

black, slick,

galloping in the pitch

of the waves in the pearly

fields of the sea,

they leap toward us,

they rise, sparkling, and vanish, and rise sparkling,

they breathe little clouds of mist, they lift perpetual smiles,

they slap their tails on the waves, grandmothers and grandfathers

enjoying the old jokes,

they circle around us,

they swim with us--

2.

a hundred white-sided dolphins

on a summer day,

each one, as God himself

could not appear more acceptable

a hundred times,

in a body blue and black threading through

the sea foam,

and lifting himself up from the opened

tents of the waves on his fishtail,

to look

with the moon of his eye

into my heart,

3.

and find there

pure, sudden, steep, sharp, painful

gratitude

that falls--

I don't know--either

unbearable tons

or the pale, bearable hand

of salvation

on my neck,

lifting me

from the boat's plain plank seat

into the world's

4.

unspeakable kindness.

It is my sixty-third summer on earth

and, for a moment, I have almost vanished

into the body of the dolphin

into the moon-eye of God,

into the white fan that lies at the bottom of the sea

with everything

that ever was, or ever will be,

supple, wild, rising on flank or fishtail--

singing or whistling or breathing damply through blowhole

at top of head.  Then, in our little boat, the dolphins suddenly gone,

we sailed on through the brisk, cheerful day.

You know, sometimes Mary says it all and better than I ever could.  This is one of those times.

After a very long day that started at 4 .m., I am at the end of my mind's capacity to form coherent thought.  Like Oliver in the poem, I was just riding in my little boat tonight, without the energy even to fall asleep.  While my wife drove us home, I was in the world but, at the same time, not in it.  Just present.

And then there was the sun, blazing gold above the trees.  When Oliver sees the one hundred white-sided dolphins in her sixty-third summer, she vanishes, becomes part of them, leaping and slapping the water.  Tonight, after over five decades of summers, I simmered in that gilded evening sun.  I didn't quite vanish, but I put my head back on the headrest and let myself detach.  Float.

Another Mary Oliver moment for Saint Marty.

July 31: "Stones," Everyday Miracles, Mary Moment

Mary Oliver is a fan of the stones . . .

Stones

by:  Mary Oliver

The white stones were mountains, then they went traveling.

The pink stones also were part of a mountain before

the glacier's tongue gathered them up.

Now they lie resting under the waves.

The green stones are lovelier than the blue stones, I thought

     for a little while,

then I changed my mind.

Stones born of the sediments tell what ooze floated down

     the outwash once.

Stones born of the fire have red stars inside their bodies,

     and seams of white quartz.

Also I admire the heft, and the circularities 

as they lie without wrists or ankles just under the water.

Also I imagine how they lie quietly all night

under the moon and whatever passes overhead--say, the floating

      lily of the night-heron.

It is apparent also how they lie relaxed under the sun's 

      golden ladders.

Each one is a slow-wheeler.

Each one is a tiny church, locked up tight.

Each one is perfect--but none of them is ready quite yet

to come to the garden, to raise corn

or the bulb of the iris.

If I lived inland I would want to take one or two home with me

just to look at in that long life of dust and grass,

but I hope I wouldn't.

I hope I wouldn't take even one like a seed from the sunflower's face,

like an ant's white egg from the warm nursery under the hill.

I hope I would leave them, in the perfect balance of things,

in the clear body of the sea.

My favorite image in this poem:  "Each one is a tiny church, locked up tight."

Most of us don't give a whole lot of thought to the stones beneath our feet.  I know I don't.  Yet, stones have stories and histories.  Ice ages.  Meteor ages.  Volcanic ages.  Moon ages.  Sun ages.  Somehow that pebble got from the top of a mountain or the bottom of sea into your shoe.  When you pick up a beach rock and skip it across the surface of a lake or ocean, you are probably undoing hundreds, if not thousands, of years of stone migration.

Stones are these everyday miracles that nobody takes the time to notice.  

Spend enough time with Mary Oliver, however, and your miracle antennae become a little more finetuned and sensitive.  I now go through my days on the lookout for wonder.  A finger of sunrise scratching the belly of a lake.  A rabbit sipping dew off grass.  Loon laughter in moonless cattails.  I call them Mary Moments.

Today's Mary Moment happened early this morning for me.  I was taking my puppy out for her morning backyard ablutions when I looked up into the branches of my lilac bushes.  There was the sun, trapped in its leaves.  I stood there, dazzled to stone for several seconds before the gravity of the day pulled me back into action.

A small miracle.  A tiny church, unlocked for a fraction of a heartbeat for Saint Marty.