Poem

Source

On Thy Wondrous Works I Will Meditate (Psalm 145)  (excerpt)
by Mary Oliver

5.

So it is not hard to understand
Where God’s body is, it is
everywhere and everything; shore and the vast
fields of water, the accidental and the intended
over here, over there. And I bow down
participate and attentive

it is so dense and apparent. And all the same I am still
unsatisfied. Standing
here, now, I am thinking
not of His thick writs and His blue
hsoulders but, still, of Him. Where, do you suppose is His
pale and wonderful mind?

6.

I would be good-oh, I would be upright and good.
To what purpose? To be shining not
sinful, not wringing out of the hours
petulance, heaviness, ashes. To what purpose?
Hope of heaven? Not that. But to enter
the other kingdom: grace, and imagination,

and the multiple sympathies: to be as a leaf, a rose,
a dolphin, a wave rising
slowly then briskly out of the darkness to touch
the limpid air, to be God’s mind’s
servant, loving with the body’s sweet mouth-its kisses, its
words-
everything.

7.

I know a man of such
mildness and kindness it is trying to
change my life. He does not
preach, teach, but simply is. It is
astonishing, for he is Christ’s ambassador
truly, by rule and act. But, more,
he is kind with the sort of kindness that shines
out, but is resolute, not fooled. He has
eaten the dark hours and could also, I think,
solider for God, riding out
under the storm clouds, against the world’s pride and unkindness
with both unassailable sweetness, and consoling word.

8.

Every morning I want to kneel down on the golden
cloth of the sand and say
some kind of musical thanks for
the world that is happening again—another day—
from the shawl of wind coming out of the 
west to the firm green

flesh of the melon lately sliced open and 
eaten, its chill and ample body
flavored with mercy. I want
to be worthy of—what? Glory? Yes, unimaginable glory.
O Lord of melons, of mercy, though I am 
not ready, nor worthy, I am climbing toward you.