Instructions for Living a Life - A Meditation
With the death of the poet Mary Oliver this past week, I felt it fitting to have her words shape this week’s meditation. She was (is) a north for me in a lot of ways, and I am tremendously grateful for all the words she gave us. She has a lot of poetry that I have committed to memory and I feel like they are powerful reminders to look beyond our ordinary and find the wonders that hide within our small, fleeting days. We can take along her poems with us, to amplify and illuminate our life and the world. This little poem is sort of a thesis for Oliver’s work, in my opinion. I would urge you to memorize it and carry it around with you:
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Through Mary’s poetry I found her to be completely and utterly herself. She wrote from a true place within story and jotted notes on her vivid experiences in the world, and I find this to be incredibly brave. Too often we write, make, or act with our critics in mind, but her poems were partnerships with the Mystery she encountered, and she was loyal to them, not her critics.
I love this pullout quote from an article by Ruth Franklin in The New Yorker, “Still, perhaps because she writes about old-fashioned subjects—nature, beauty, and, worst of all, God—she has not been taken seriously by most poetry critics. None of her books has received a full-length review in the Times.”
And yet, she was beloved by thousands and thousands (millions probably), continued to write to poems unto death, and became one of the best selling poets in the United States. She resonates with people, because they can see themselves in her poems, because she was bold enough and honest enough to address her love, and I am encouraged and inspired by her tenacity to not care that supposedly her poetry wrote of “old-fashioned subjects - nature, beauty and God.”
To me, these subjects are timeless and are foundational for being a human, alive, on Earth. They are fundamental, and yes they can be tropes of clichéd, but that’s because there is something shakingly elemental in them that connects with the deepest places in us. Often times, its those too cynical to look nature, beauty and God (however you define God or Gods) straight in the eyes will call them old-fashioned. Mary dropped bread crumbs for us to follow her into the place where Mystery truly dwells.
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Today I am sick on the couch, and my stomach is churning, and to be honest, I didn’t feel like writing, but out of loyalty to Mystery, and out of dedication to Mary, I am.
So here are a few quiet observations from my sick-bed:
Outside, the silver-blueish sky is raining, making the street below our 3rd floor apartment shine and glisten. The tree branches, bare and silhouetted gently sway in the wind, covered in tiny water droplets that look like jewels against the dark light. I remember standing at the Women’s March yesterday in the cold, warmed by the act of so many human bodies coming together in solidarity for common cause(s), our feet growing numb with time but standing together. I remember using those same feet to take a walk the day before into Prospect Park as an ode to Mary. I looked at seeds and scruffy dogs playing and romping in the snow. I watched the textured sky as planes passed, half concealed by clouds overhead, en route to La Guardia. I heard sparrows chirp out of sight in the thickets, only revealing themselves with patience as I had to stand there a whole 15 minutes before I could clearly see one. I felt the thick bark of sycamores, planted on a hill by the Boy Scouts in 1919, in dedication to Teddy Roosevelt.
I call this group of trees, The 1919 Grove. And this is the place in the park that feels the most like home to me. Each time I arrive, I feel our relationship strengthen, and it reminds me to be consistent.
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Today, may you set aside your cynicism, and the judgement of others and look Mystery directly in the eyes.
May your openness and curiosity increase
May you share what you find with us.
Happy Sunday Friends :)
