Ode to Mary Oliver

Ode to Mary Oliver

How many hours

Do you

Or I

Have?

Not just

That we’ve

Tucked away

Like magpies

But how many

Do we have

In all our cosmic possession?

How many golden autumn evenings

Where the dusk rises 

blue and smokey

Against the gilt 

of the setting sun?

How many nights

Black with it’s liquid rain and worry

Pacing

Up and down

Like fingers 

Over your fragile spine?

How many meals,

Eating at this scrubbed wooden table

With your children?

How many meals at the same wooden table 

with your parents?

How much time do we have, 

for business meetings,

Stop lights, 

Weeding the flower bed

and watching our children sleep? 

How many more moments do we have?

To look up

And feel the rain on our faces

Splashing like time across our laughing lips and closed tight lids?

To look into the person

You’ve sat next to

For the past twenty years

And have the courage

To look at them with fresh eyes 

And let that hit you

And let yourself love them

Deeper 

and new again

What if this

Is it?

What are you doing with your one wild and precious life?