A Thousand Mornings

Mary Oliver’s most recent book of poems traces rainbows in waterfalls, the ebb and flow of tides, stump rot, and black snakes; “the disasters, the unbelievable / yet approved decisions” in the daily news; and the presence of God, everywhere (63). The thirty-six poems include a seven-part sequence, as well as an adaptation of the well-known section of Christopher Smart’s Jubilate Agno entitled “For I Will Consider My Dog Percy.” Early in A Thousand Mornings, the speaker continues a running conversation. “You fuss over life with your clever / words, mulling and chewing on its meaning, while / we just live it,” a now older animal remarks in “Good-Bye Fox” (14). The poem “And Bob Dylan Too” offers a response. “Anything worth thinking about is worth / singing about,” the poem begins. Dylan’s words affirm the human impulse to rise into “songs of praise, songs of love, songs / of sorrow,” as Oliver writes (17). Another poem, “Today,” embraces the quiet mind, “flying low” and “not saying a word,” as “The world goes on as it must, / the bees in the garden rumbling a little, / the fish leaping, the gnats getting eaten” (23

American poetry · Art · Conversation · Literature · Meaning (existential · Poetry · Praise · Singing · Sorrow · Irish and British Studies · Psychology · Communication · History

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