In Blackwater Woods

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars
of light,

are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

— Mary Oliver

Epitaph

When I die
Give what’s left of me away
To children
And old men that wait to die.

And if you need to cry,
Cry for your brother
Walking the street beside you.

And when you need me,
Put your arms
Around anyone
And give them
What you need to give to me.

I want to leave you something,
Something better
Than words
Or sounds.

Look for me
In the people I’ve known
Or loved,
And if you cannot give me away,
At least let me live on in your eyes
And not your mind.

You can love me most
By letting
Hands touch hands,
By letting bodies touch bodies,
And by letting go
Of children
That need to be free.

Love doesn’t die,
People do.
So, when all that’s left of me
Is love,
Give me away.

- Merrit Malloy

The Well of Grief

Those who will not slip beneath

the still surface on the well of grief

turning down through its black water

to the place we cannot breathe

will never know the source from which we drink,

the secret water, cold and clear,

nor find in the darkness glimmering

the small round coins

thrown by those who wished for something else.

- David Whyte

Perceptual Portal

My antennae sweep and scan

for reception, for a portal

in perception, for a porous

passage to a green breathing

land where every presence

offers itself to be known,

where everything speaks,

even galaxies, even stone,

where interspecies

lovetalk leaps like

flashing fish and flying

dragons in blue-pooled

dream canyons, where poems

sprout from cracked bark

of sequoia and oak, and

madcap music mushrooms

from decay and darkness.

Sometimes human beings listen,

ears tilting in a creaturely way,

tuned to something not entirely

audible though there is no barrier

to reception, and through

this listening we might remember

how to live, hearing the old

voice that still bells forth

from the primal body

who birthed us all,

the old voice reverberating

along tendrils of mycelia

that entwine the human psyche

with the mother tree:

living psyche of Earth.

It’s not a far country or fictional

galaxy, but an unfiltered mode

of consciousness with no screen

to block or deaden the Others

and their always-streaming voices,

their ancient kinships, star-studded

extravaganzas, where even human

beings might harmonize their wildly

necessary sound. I have sojourned

plenty in that stone-talking terrain

but lost the way of return

busy as I was with all varieties

of civilized absurdity,

forgetting I even had

antennae, formed long

before we became human.

But here: a passageway

opens on the mossy edge

of imagination. Shadows

illustrate the way, flicker

and hum their own language.

Praise the revived antennae

and sing with the Others now:

cackling trills, creaking

dreams, moon swoons, rough

poems sprouting from

portals in perception.

- Geneen Marie Haugen

Mindful

Every day

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? 

- Mary Oliver