And I Too
It feels like a good day for a little Mary Oliver.
At the River Clarion
by Mary Oliver
1.
I don’t know who God is exactly. But I’ll tell you this.
I was sitting in the river named Clarion,
on a
water splashed stone
and all afternoon I listened to the voices
of the river talking.
Whenever the water struck the stone it
had
something to say,
and the water itself, and even the
mosses trailing
under the water.
And slowly, very slowly, it became
clear to me
what they were saying.
Said the river: I am part of holiness.
And I too, said the stone. And I too
whispered
the moss beneath the water.
I’d been to the river before, a few times.
Don’t blame the river that nothing happened
quickly.
You don’t hear such voices in an hour
or a day.
You don’t hear them at all if selfhood
has stuffed your ears.
And it’s difficult to hear anything anyway,
through
all the traffic, and ambition.