Mindful by Mary Oliver


Everyday
I see or hear
  something that more or less

kills me
 with delight,
  that leaves me
    like a needle

in the haystack
of light.
  It was what I was born for —
    to look, to listen,

to lose myself
 inside this soft world —
  to instruct myself
    over and over

in joy,
and acclamation.
  Nor am I talking
    about the exceptional,

the fearful, the dreadful,
 the very extravagant —
  but of the ordinary,
    the common, the very drab,

the daily presentations.
 Oh, good scholar,
  I say to myself,
    how can you help

but grow wise
 with such teachings
  as these —
    the untrimmable light

of the world,
the ocean’s shine,
  the prayers that are made
    out of grass?

“Mindful” by Mary Oliver from Why I Wake Early. © Beacon Press, 2005.

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