Monday's Poetry: "The Journey"

by Pa Rock
Poetry Appreciator

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver died this past week at the age of eighty-three.  The prolific poet left behind a body of much-loved and memorable work including perhaps her two best known efforts:  "Wild Geese" and "The Journey."

I have chosen to highlight "The Journey" as this week's poetry selection,  It is an inspired piece showing an individual's awakening and transformation  into a person with purpose, someone who will not be sidelined by the noise and confusion of the life that is happening along the edges.  Mary Oliver obviously lived life as she wrote it.

Please enjoy "The Journey" and perhaps accept it as a bit of a personal challenge to the stubborn complacency and noise which tugs at the ankles of us all.


The Journey
by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice --

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voice behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do --

determined to save

the only life that you could save.