#900
The Summer Day by 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? Art by Weronika Siwiec
Recommended listening: Poets reading poetry Better Late Volume 2 - Lowlit compilation 10 Hours Of Relaxing Planet Earth II Island Sounds - Earth Unplugged
Links of the Day: How to forgive Things My Mother Told Me Fabric Sketchbook
Wooden domino row building machine 100 Days of Overthinking
Scroll: 5 Poems on Childhood
David Hockney: A Bigger Picture
(The idea of having sent out 900 newsletters so far makes me giddy with happiness. Here's to 900 more! Have a lovely day.)