Poems by Mary Oliver

Snowy Egret

A late summer night and the snowy egret
has come again to the shallows in front of my house

as he has for forty years.
Don't think he is a casual part of my life,

that white stroke in the dark.



                     



Meeting Wolf

There are no words
inside his mouth,
inside his golden eyes.

So we stand silent,
both of us tense
under the speechless but faithful trees.

And this is what I think:
I have given him
intrusion.

He has given me
a glimpse into a better but now broken world.
Not his doing, but ours.



Water

What is the vitality and necessity
of clean water?
Ask the man who is ill, who is lifting
his lips to the cup.

Ask the forest.