Pay attention

Be astonished

Tell about it

Mary Oliver

‘Invitation’ by Mary Oliver

Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy

and very important day
for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles

for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,

or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender?
Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air

as they strive
m

One by Mary Oliver The mosquito is so small it takes almost nothing to ruin it. Each leaf, the same. And the black ant, hurrying. So many lives, so many fortunes! Every morning, I walk softly and with forward glances down to the ponds and through the pinewoods. Mushrooms, even, have but a brief hour before the slug creeps to the feast, before the p

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 pal