A (Found) Poem from October

Nature is not my landscape
The birds and trees and animals
Small to large
I love them all but
Cannot remember their names
And species cannot
Identify them by leaf or by dropping

My canvas has nothing to do with politics
Or the hip scene, or a life of debauchery
Has neither to do with country living nor
The fast-paced rat race
I find no solace there
And no inspiration

It’s the small, available things
(As Mary Oliver says)
That kill me
That fill me
That send me to sea

The pursed lip or pinky finger
The song, the chord, the single note
The tail wag
The toaster pop
The smell of mint
The scent of cedar
From opened box

These things send me
Shaking
Hungry
To the page
Where I scribble until
I’m full

More Mary Oliver

from "Whelks"

...

All my life
I have been restless--
I have felt there is something
more wonderful than gloss--
than wholeness--
than staying at home.
I have not been sure what it is.
But every morning on the wide shore
I pass what is perfect and shining
to look for the whelks, whose edges
have rubbed so long against the world
they have snapped and crumbled--
they have almost vanished,
with the last relinquishing
of their unrepeatable energy,
back into everything else.
When I find one
I hold it in my hand,
I look out over that shanking fire,
I shut my eyes. Not often,
but now and again there's a moment
when the heart cries aloud:
yes, I am willing to be
that wild darkness,
that long, blue body of light.