THE SUMMER DAY
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean--
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down,
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
— MARY OLIVER
from
New and Selected Poems, 1992
Beacon Press, Boston, MA
Copyright 1992 by Mary Oliver
¶
Oh God, you gave us the fields of this week’s days.
We strolled through them
idle at times, but quite often not
blessed for sure, but usually unable to keep that in mind.
Except for sometimes
those times we paid attention
whether out of a sharp pain we couldn’t ignore, a dull ache we tried to
or because there was joy (sufficient in such tiny amounts!)
Whether out of feverish desire, casual curiosity, holy longing
or because you broke some silence (and not a minute too soon).
Thank you, mysterious God, for those times
and for our paying attention (it’s easy some times, almost out of the question others
and yet you seem bent on it happening more often).
Show us, then, what to do —
with
through
during
because of
— our one wild and precious life.
by Z. M. Willette
