How it is with us, and how it is with them

 

We become religious,

 then we turn from it,

then we are in need and maybe we turn back.

We turn to making money,

then we turn to the moral life,

then we think about money again.

We meet wonderful people, but lose them

   in our busyness.

We're, as the saying goes, all over the place.

Steadfastness, it seems,

is more about dogs than about us.

One of the reasons we love them so much.

--Mary Oliver

[Photo of our daughter and her dog, Maui].