There's enough metaphysics, theology, philosophy, natural history, botany, science and linguistic analysis in Mary Oliver's poems to satisfy the curiosity of most poetry readers. But her learning is carried with duck-down lightness, because her mind isn't the repository of a polymath, it is the place where experience is held with gentle patience until it yields its truth. Her heart is replete with reflected on human experience, her mind erudite, first-hand informed and passionately present in the world she observes, notes, notices, attends to and allows entry. And in those reserved places of contemplative waiting, and deep intentional listening, where experiences are not subjected to critical analysis but to receptive openness, in those places, poems are born.
Oliver's poetry can be uncomplicatedly frank, or sensitively oblique, tenderly humorous and occasionally serious pushing towards melancholy. But I haven't found many of her poems leave me puzzled - though maybe the truly great poet should occasionally leave us unsure, lacking the answers we seek, perplexed but thus even more passionately interested in the question, if there is one. What Oliver offers is poetry that points the finger and says "Look". And look, not just to see, but to appreciate, to recover perspective on our lives, to restore the capacity for wonder, gratitude and praise. But also to take with full seriousness our hurts, our problems, the bleak despair that can at times envelope us, but not to take it all so seriously that we overlook the primary fact of our being alive, and of the possibilities and gifts that such livingness bestows.
To that extent she is a writer theological students should encounter - and they will next year! "Look", she says - at the world, at your heart, at your neighbour at flowers, birds, landscapes and people. Look until you see. And not only see but understasnd what it is you see in relation to the life you are now living. Here's an example of what I mean:
Mysteries, Yes
Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous
to be understood.
How grass can be nourishing in the
mouths of the lambs.
How rivers and stones are forever
in allegiance with gravity
while we ourselves dream of rising..
How two hands touch and the bonds will
never be broken.
How people come, from delight
or the scars of damage,
to the comfort of a poem.
Let me keep my distance, always, from those
who think they have the answers.
Let me keep company always with those who say
"Look!" and laugh in astonishment,
and bow their heads.
Mary Oliver, Evidence (Bloodaxe, 2009) page 62.
Now. Is that not a poem to set in a theological reflection essay with the simple instruction. "Discuss with reference to your life."
And even if you aren't a student - same invitation, "Come and ponder".
Comments