Spring

Spring
–Mary Oliver
from New and Selected Poems

Somewhere
    a black bear
      has just risen from sleep
        and is staring

down the mountain.
     All night
       in the brisk and shallow restlessness
         of early spring

I think of her,
     her four black fists
       flicking the gravel,
         her tongue

like a red fire
     touching the grass,
       the cold water.
         There is only one question:

how to love this world.
     I think of her
       rising
         like a black and leafy ledge

to sharpen her claws against
     the silence
       of the trees.
         Whatever else

my life is
     with its poems
       and its music
         and its glass cities,

it is also this dazzling darkness
     coming
       down the mountain,
         breathing and tasting;

all day I think of her–
     her white teeth,
       her wordlessness,
         her perfect love.

Cyn is Rick's wife, Katie's Mom, and Esther & Oliver's Mémé. She's also a professional geek, avid reader, fledgling coder, enthusiastic gamer (TTRPGs), occasional singer, and devoted stitcher.
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