We Should Be Well Prepared
by: Mary Oliver
The way the plovers cry goodbye.
The way the dead fox keeps on looking down the hill
with open eye.
The way the leaves fall, and then there's the long wait.
The way someone says: we must never meet again.
The way mold spots the cake,
the way sourness overtakes the cream.
The way the river water rushes by, never to return.
The way the days go by, never to return.
The way somebody comes back, but only in a dream.
This whole poem, every line, is a farewell. Plover and foxes, autumn leaves and sour milk. For Oliver, life is just a dress rehearsal for letting go. As a poet, that idea appeals to my darker sensibilities a great deal.
If I treated each day as my last on this planet, I wouldn't sit in an office on an 85-degree day, grading papers or writing grants or responding to emails. Nope. I'd be Whitman lying naked in a field of wild grass with my lover. Or Oliver gulping mouthfuls of water from Blackwater Pond. Or even Frost pretending to be a chicken farmer.
Perhaps, the universe would be a much kinder, gentler place if everyone came down with a case of last-day syndrome. Hospitals and classrooms would be empty. Beaches would be packed. Maybe there would be a shortage of frozen turkeys because everyone would be making special meals--one last Thanksgiving with family and friends. Donald Trump would spend his last day golfing because nobody would give a shit about him or his agenda, and maybe Vladimir Putin would decide to binge-watch all the seasons of RuPaul's Drag Race instead of bombing Ukraine. Last days put things into perspective.
I've written 5,294 posts since I started this blog. I can honestly say that, each time after I published another post, I thought, "Okay, that was my last one." When I started Saint Marty back in 2010, I wasn't sure what my goal was. To write every day? Go viral and become an Internet star? Be discovered by an talent agent and offered a six-figure book deal? Labor away in obscurity and leave behind thousands of pages of writing for my kids and grandkids to read?
Saint Marty has become a part of my daily life. I actually feel guilty if I don't write some kind of post. When I really do face my last day, I hope I have a chance to blog one final time. Offer up one ultimate piece of wisdom. Say goodbye. Of course, I don't know when my last day will be. It could be next week or month or year or decade. Or it could be tonight.
If it is tonight, I want everyone reading these words to know that I've lived a really good, complicated life, filled with joys and sorrows. I love my beautiful wife and two smart, amazing children who make me laugh every day. I also have been blessed by siblings whom I love. That doesn't mean we got along all the time. Far from it. But love doesn't vanish. It just changes from solid to liquid to gas to solid again, depending on the day, hour, and time of year.
I have been blessed to be a part of my wife's family for a very long time, too. They are so much a part of me that they're like breath, picking up the pieces when I've fallen apart, cheering me on when I've crossed finish lines. They understand and accept me for who I am--a broken weirdo with a thing for poetry.
It's impossible to name all the individuals who've made a difference in my life. That would end up being one of those interminable "Afterwords" in a book where the author lists editors and writing group members and kindergarten teachers and pets and mechanics and therapists and hair stylists and agents and choir directors and AA sponsors. People who have no idea how much of an impact they've had on me. (I will brag that I have some pretty amazing nieces and nephews, as well as a great niece who is da bomb.)
That is my last day message for Tuesday, May 30, 2023. If I'm granted a tomorrow, I will undoubtedly have a different last day message.
Stay tuned. Saint Marty may be back after these messages.
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