WILD GEESE
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
YesBiscuit
GWEN SMITH
/ November 9, 2016Beautiful.
Sent from my iPhone
Karen F
/ November 9, 2016So healing. I needed this today, 11/9, bookend to 9/11.
db
/ November 9, 2016Absolutely!
mikken
/ November 10, 2016Very nice.
We’ll be all right.
Stacy
/ November 10, 2016Beautiful! This can be related to the recent results of the Election day. No single man controls a country, thus— we need not worry too much as life will still go on. Cheers!
Scarlet Long
/ November 10, 2016Tears.
Lovely.
Needed.
Tina Clark
/ November 10, 2016Thank you. Very beautiful and healing, just what we all need. Love Mary Oliver’s poetry.