This World

 

I would like to write a poem about the world that has in it
nothing fancy.
But it seems impossible.
Whatever the subject, the morning sun
glimmers it.
The tulip feels the heat and flaps its petals open and becomes a star.
The ants bore into the peony bud and there is a dark
    pinprick well of sweetness.
As for the stones on the beach, forget it.
Each one could be set in gold.
So I tried with my eyes shut, but of course the birds
    were singing.
And the aspen trees were shaking the sweetest music
    out of their leaves.
And that was followed by, guess what, a momentous and
    beautiful silence
as comes to all of us, in little earfuls, if we're not too
    hurried to hear it.
As for spiders, how the dew hangs in their webs
    even if they say nothing, or seem to say nothing.
So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe they sing.
So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe the stars sing too,
    and the ants, and the peonies, and the warm stones,
so happy to be where they are, on the beach, instead of being
    locked up in gold.

--Mary Oliver 

[Nā Pali Coast in Kauai]