#poetry

Wellness Check by Andrea Gibson

In any moment, on any given day, I can measure my wellness by this question:

Is my attention on loving, or is my attention on who isn't loving me?

— You Better Be Lightning by Andrea Gibson

Shadows by Mary Oliver

Everyone knows the great energies running amok cast terrible shadows, that each of the so-called senseless acts has its thread looping back through the world and into a human heart. And meanwhile the gold-trimmed thunder wanders the sky; the river may be filling the cellars of the sleeping town. Cyclone, fire, and their merry cousins bring us to grief—but these are the hours with the old wooden-god faces; we lift them to our shoulders like so many black coffins, we continue walking into the future. I don't mean there are no bodies in the river, or bones broken by the wind. I mean everyone who has heard the lethal train-roar of the tornado swears there was no mention ever of any person, or reason—I mean the waters rise without any plot upon history, or even geography. Whatever power of the earth rampages, we turn to it dazed but anonymous eyes; whatever the name of the catastrophe, it is never the opposite of love.

— Devotions by Mary Oliver

We Are Surprised by Ada Limón

Now, we take the moon into the middle of our brains

so we look like roadside stray cats with bright flashlight-white eyes

in our faces, but no real ideas of when or where to run.

We linger on the field's green edge and say, Someday, son, none of this

will be yours. Miracles are all around. We're not so much homeless

as we are home-free, penny-poor, but plenty lucky for love and leaves

that keep breaking the fall. Here it is: the new way of living with the world

inside of us so we cannot lose it, and we cannot be lost. You and me

are us and them, and it and sky. It's hard to believe we didn't

know that before; it's hard to believe we were so hollowed out, so drained,

only so we could shine a little harder when the light finally came.

— Bright Dead Things by Ada Limón