The Summer Day: Mary Oliver

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 pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

Tell me, what else should I have done? To make a prayer. To spend my life. What else?

I've been thinking this week about how I am spending my life. It's one of those things - you don't know exactly how much you have, but it's not something you want to hoard, either. You want to share your life, live expansively - you never know how much you have, but while you have it, you can have as much 'life' as you choose.

Do I want an overflowing palm, or a tight fist?

I don't know exactly how to pray, either. I usually just say, "Thank you" to the general direction of the sky, when something I need or want happens, or when I am moved. I say, "Please help" when I need help. I let my heart fill up and tears flow when I see something beautiful. I try to pay attention; to things, to people, to nature.

What else?

How do I want to spend my life, my one wild and precious life?

A good reminder about why I'm struggling to complete my personal 5- and 10-year plan. Part of me wants to have a good plan, ask for good things, construct a 'good' life that is what I want. And part of me wants to let things unfold as they will (which they will do anyway).

Maybe the key is to 'plan' for days of meadow-walking and beachcombing. How do I plan a life full of joy?