“…sometimes it takes you a long time to sound like yourself.”
- Miles Davis
There is only one poet who slides through metaphor and epiphany like a shoal of fish in a stream; who knows the secret language of trees and the whispering grass; who can speak essential truths with the sangfroid of a summer’s day.
Today’s Mary Oliver poem is as much a journey outward, into the wild, as it is inwards. It is one of those rare poems that clings to your jacket on a rainy day, as darkness swirls around and you feel the sweat of life seep into your skin.
This year has sent a chill down the dark alleys of our cities of belonging. Our secret selves have slipped through the cracks of our realities, and we try to paper over the fissures with poetry, with art and with hope. We cut through the pastures of isolation with nostalgia’s scythe and with laughter.
Today’s poem is a message in a bottle that the sea brings to the thirsty shore - read it with love.
