Literary Advent Calendar Day 3: Starlings

' I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,
as though I had wings...'

In this season of waiting and winter, there are many beautiful things... 


Starlings in Winter - Mary Oliver

Chunky and noisy,
but with stars in their black feathers,
they spring from the telephone wire
and instantly

they are acrobats
in the freezing wind.
And now, in the theater of air,
they swing over buildings,

dipping and rising;
they float like one stippled star
that opens,
becomes for a moment fragmented,

then closes again;
and you watch
and you try
but you simply can't imagine

how they do it
with no articulated instruction, no pause,
only the silent confirmation
that they are this notable thing, 

this wheel of many parts, that can rise and spin
over and over again,
full of gorgeous life.

Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us,
even in the leafless winter,
even in the ashy city.
I am thinking now
of grief, and of getting past it;

I feel my boots
trying to leave the ground,
I feel my heart
pumping hard. I want

to think again of dangerous and noble things.
I want to be light and frolicsome.
I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,
as though I had wings.

Poems for a Sunny Day: Mary Oliver

What a beautiful day! A beautiful day to lounge in the sun, relax, soak up the light. One of those beautiful days you just want to sit and look at it all day, let it seep into your soul. 

And what better poet to read than Mary Oliver on such a day? Her poems really exhibit and explore how beautiful a day it really is, or can be, if we stop to take account of it all,  be attentive and appreciative, really look - 'Looking I mean not just standing around, but standing around as though with your arms open.' 

So since reading her today, that's what I've been trying to do. Sitting still in the sunny golden afternoon, looking and marvelling with my arms open.  I saw six pigeons frolick and splash about in the neighbourhood fountain, watched the blue sky haze with heat, lay on the grass, admired the flowers that have sprung up everywhere, got sunburned and listened to the birds singing and the green greening and the clouds drifting and came to the conclusion that yes, this really is a precious life. 

Mary Oliver's luminous sentiments are everywhere to behold, even in the chants of passers-bys' 'beautiful day!' greetings. The simple lyrics of these poems describe something so simple it  sometimes eludes us: to enjoy life.  So don't forget it. And sunny days remind us everytime.

Enjoying the sun, 

Siobhán.

 

Such Singing in the Wild Branches - Mary Oliver

It was spring
and finally I heard him
among the first leaves—
then I saw him clutching the limb

in an island of shade
with his red-brown feathers
all trim and neat for the new year.
First, I stood still

and thought of nothing.
Then I began to listen.
Then I was filled with gladness—
and that's when it happened,

when I seemed to float,
to be, myself, a wing or a tree—
and I began to understand
what the bird was saying,

and the sands in the glass
stopped
for a pure white moment
while gravity sprinkled upward

like rain, rising,
and in fact
it became difficult to tell just what it was that was singing—
it was the thrush for sure, but it seemed

not a single thrush, but himself, and all his brothers,
and also the trees around them,
as well as the gliding, long-tailed clouds
in the perfectly blue sky— all, all of them

were singing.
And, of course, yes, so it seemed,
so was I.
Such soft and solemn and perfect music doesn't last

for more than a few moments.
It's one of those magical places wise people
like to talk about.
One of the things they say about it, that is true,

is that, once you've been there,
you're there forever.
Listen, everyone has a chance.
Is it spring, is it morning?

Are there trees near you,
and does your own soul need comforting?
Quick, then— open the door and fly on your heavy feet; the song
may already be drifting away.

Peonies - Mary Oliver

This morning the green fists of the peonies are getting ready
   to break my heart
     as the sun rises,
        as the sun strokes them with his old, buttery fingers

and they open--
   pools of lace,
      white and pink--
       and all day the black ants climb over them,

boring their deep and mysterious holes
    into the curls,
      craving the sweet sap,
        taking it away

to their dark, underground cities--
   and all day
      under the shifty wind,
       as in a dance to the great wedding,

the flowers bend their bright bodies,
   and tip their fragrance to the air,
     and rise,
       their red stems holding

all that dampness and recklessness
    gladly and lightly,
      and there it is again--
        beauty the brave, the exemplary,

blazing open.
    Do you love this world?
      Do you cherish your humble and silky life?
       Do you adore the green grass, with its terror beneath?

Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
   and softly,
      and exclaiming of their dearness,
       fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,

with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
    their eagerness
      to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
        nothing, forever? 

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? 

Saturday Short

Saturday morning. Sunshine. The last of the August hay-bale-yellow kind maybe. And what it brings: many possibilities on the horizon, like a host of amber-lit lanterns being set off into sky. (The Chinese lanterns pictured; stumbled across these surprisingly in a shop yesterday and was so tempted to buy them. The ritual of lighting and setting off, all in the name of new beginnings, is one I find hard to resist. It'd be like a small-scale meteor shower, the Perseids part two, the ones we never did get to see here...)
 

So just a short entry today. Just a few words before the day begins. Before an afternoon of coffee and newspaper-browsing, punctuated by some sun-lounging and day-dreaming in between, and an evening of laissez-faire luxury. Because Saturday is the one day where we seem able to throw off the shackles off the week. It comes like a breath of fresh air at the end of the week, fresh cotton, a green-grass rest.
 

The sun is shining today, like a long-awaited encore. And what better way to start a sunny day than with Mary Oliver, the American spiritual-nature poet, whose poems are truly uplifting in their awe-filled and joyful look at the world. (If a poem was ever a vitamin for the soul, it's hers.) This poem captures the sentiments of a sunny day, how everything seems beautiful again and full of possibility and renewal. Which could also be said to be the predominant feelings in any of Oliver's poems.

Enjoy.

~ Siobhán.


'Morning Poem' -Mary Oliver 

Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange
 

sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again
 

and fasten themselves to the high branches —
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands
 

of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails
 

for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it

the thorn
that is heavier than lead —
if it’s all you can do
to keep on trudging —
 

there is still
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted —
 

each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,
 

whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.

Solstice Sentiments

 

Oh, the summer night
Has a smile of light
And she sits on a sapphire throne.
                                                     ~Barry Cornwall

Today of course is the Solstice, the longest day of the year and the official beginning to summer. A magical point in the astrological calender when the sun 'stands still' in our Northern Hemisphere. Focusing its spotlight on us for a brief but precious interlude. Full of light and life-affirming golden ray glories. And outside, it's raining. Wahey, welcome to Irish weather...

A day for worshipping the sun (if we could only see it...!) Or at least for celebrating it. The sun is our life-force after all. It was even Superman's fuel of choice. It blooms and blossoms life. Lightens dark. Warms our skins and souls. It as as much a part of us as the air we breathe. I'm convinced that we Irish all have weather-vanes embedded in our souls that swing to a heartwarming emotional south when the sun smiles on us. Sunny days make sunny dispositions. We are sun-dependant and sun-resplendent.

But how to worship it exactly, without travelling to Stonehenge? Practise the Yoga sun salutation, feeling muscles arc and stretch into majestic gestures of praise?  Dance around the garden at sunset positively hippylicious? Or wake to greet the sunrise? Maybe wear yellow or orange all day?

I'd say just to revel in everything the sun represents. In its warmth and light.  Both physical and metaphorical. 'Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you.' Be dazzled by its brilliant bastion of optimism, 'nature's Prozac' as it's been dubbed. Bask in being alive.  Be grateful for our prosperity and abundance. Salute the sun inside us, as Picasso suggested -  'the sun is a thousand rays in your belly.'

And to us writers, our inspiration. Gold ornate He-man of the sky inspiring and lighting. Blinding and brilliant. Apollo god of the sun, one of the most powerful of the Greek gods was also patron of the arts, specifically music and poetry. And leader of the Muses. So sunshine not only dictates our moods, but also our creative urges. All hail.

From the solstice, the sun will turn once more and start back on its winter journey. Now is the time to soak it up and enjoy. Let its presence fill us with golden light and warmth and light and illuminate all of our endeavours!

Solstice greetings!

~ Siobhán

'The Sun' - Mary Oliver

     Have you ever seen 
anything 
in your life 
more wonderful 

than the way the sun, 
every evening, 
relaxed and easy, 
floats toward the horizon 

and into the clouds or the hills, 
or the rumpled sea, 
and is gone-- 
and how it slides again 

out of the blackness, 
every morning, 
on the other side of the world, 
like a red flower 

streaming upward on its heavenly oils, 
say, on a morning in early summer, 
at its perfect imperial distance-- 
and have you ever felt for anything 
such wild love-- 
do you think there is anywhere, in any language, 
a word billowing enough 
for the pleasure 

that fills you, 
as the sun 
reaches out, 
as it warms you 

as you stand there, 
empty-handed-- 
or have you too 
turned from this world-- 

or have you too 
gone crazy 
for power, 
for things?