Oh the Things We Miss Because We Aren't Looking

Some days I hit "Publish" on a blog post and I wish I had taken longer to work on it. There are some that explored topics I will likely explore more fully in the future because they didn't get the time or the quality that they deserved. Thursday's post was one of those.

Here is the poem that provided some of the inspiration for that post:

Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting–
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

"Wild Geese", a Poem by Mary Oliver

In her poem "When Death Comes" Mary Oliver says:

When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

A friend of mine, one of the most giving people I know, suffered yet another tragedy in her life a few days ago. She awoke to find her husband of 27 years lying dead on their bedroom floor. The hardships this woman has suffered in the last year are numerous.  She deserves so much more.

The poem in the video is also by Mary Oliver, "Wild Geese". It acknowledges that we all have hardship. We all feel lonely at times. And when we do we don't have to be anything. Just be. Feel what you feel and share what you feel but also don't forget the world goes on and has much to offer.

I used to get angry when someone would say "Well, life goes on" and shrug off whatever was upsetting me. But you know what? It does. The world keeps turning.  The sun rises and falls. My children still count on me and need me. The bills still have to be paid and the cat still has to be fed. The world doesn't stop because of some turmoil in my life. And really, how big is that turmoil anyway?