The Sunflowers
by: Mary Oliver
Come with me
into the field of sunflowers.
Their faces are burnished disks,
their dry spines
creak like ship masts,
their green leaves,
so heavy and many,
fill all day with the sticky
sugars of the sun.
Come with me
to visit the sunflowers,
they are shy
but want to be friends;
they have wonderful stories
of when they were young--
the important weather,
the wandering crows.
Don't be afraid
to ask them questions!
Their bright faces,
which follow the sun,
will listen, and all
those rows of seeds--
each one a new life!--
hope for a deeper acquaintance;
each of them, though it stands
in a crowd of many,
like a separate universe,
is lonely, the long work
of turning their lives
into a celebration
is not easy. Come
and let us talk with those modest faces,
the simple garments of leaves,
the coarse roots in the earth
so uprightly burning.
Oliver invites the reader to walk with her into the field of sunflowers, to commune with shy, beautiful faces filled with the sticky sugars of the sun. The sunflowers don't brag about their hard work, transforming themselves into celebration and joy. Rather, they wait modestly for Oliver (or someone else) to approach for a deeper acquaintance.
It's almost past sunflower season in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I have a neighbor who grows sunflowers every year, and I look forward to seeing their golden faces each September. Now that it's the first day of October and the nights are getting cooler, my neighbor's sunflowers are looking more like a choir of tipsy tenors, leaning on one another, trying to find the first note of the song.
My friend, Helen, loved sunflowers. Her final collection of poems, published after her passing, contains a whole galaxy of sunflowers. I woke up this morning thinking of her. When I sat down to take notes in my journal on today's Mary Oliver poem, I discovered that it was about sunflowers. This afternoon, I walked past my neighbor's yard and admired this year's crop of sun-filled beauty.
In short, I have been haunted and hunted by sunflowers these last few days. Because Helen has been in my thoughts so much, I have to believe that she's been sending me these light-drenched oracles, in word and world. It has been a Helen of Joy kind of weekend.
So, you'll excuse me if I don't come to any profound conclusions tonight. Instead, I'm just going to thank my friend for this saffron blizzard. Yes, Helen, I stopped and admired the sunflowers today. Yes, as I stared into their faces, I thought of you and your unruly mop of blonde inspiration.
And Saint Marty felt himself cracking open, a seed lifting its face to the bright light of poetry.
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