the deepening ground

Saturday afternoon, my youngest son and I were preparing to powerwash our porch furniture before dressing them in a fresh coat of Hunter Green paint. As I struggled to remove the nozzle from the hose, two moles popped out of the ground at the top of the stone steps, squeaking and tussling for a brief moment before scurrying off in different directions, the one streaming down the steps into a crack at the bottom corner of the last rise. Within moments his pink nose peaked out and he burst from his hiding place to burrow beneath the decaying leaves below.

In my bedtime reading that night, I read the following poem. Though I try not to post poems by the same poet twice in a row (one of those odd unspoken rules of mine), the timing was too perfect and the fresh invitation to slow down and be more mindful too important to postpone, especially during the summer when the normal routines of life dissolve into projects, trips, and rare moments of laziness. Fittingly, my wife and I celebrated our 28th anniversary this weekend. What a poignant reminder of all those seemingly “ordinary … common … very drab … [and] daily presentations” that make up married life together, and what a gift to see them as the miraculous wonders they are that comprise the mystery of marriage! Don’t miss the mindful moments of this new day!

Mindful by Mary Oliver

Every day
     I see or I hear
          something
               that more or less

kills me
     with delight,
          that leaves me
               like a needle

in the haystack
     of light.
          It is what I was born for —
               to look, to listen,

to lose myself
     inside this soft world —
          to instruct myself
               over and over

in joy,
     and acclamation.
          Nor am I talking
               about the exceptional,

the fearful, the dreadful,
     the very extravagant —
          but of the ordinary,
               the common, the very drab,

the daily presentations.
     Oh, good scholar,
          I say to myself,
               how can you help

but grow wise
     with such teachings
          as these —
               the untrimmable light

of the world,
     the ocean's shine,
          the prayers that are made
               out of grass?

“Mindful” by Mary Oliver from Why I Wake Early: New Poems by Mary Oliver © Beacon Press, 2004: pg. 58-59.