You do not have to be good...

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

~ Mary Oliver, ~ New and Selected Poems

I found this wonderful poem over at Susan's place. It reminds me of Canada (the geese and the prairies) and of Wendell Berry's poetry, and of the relief and joy of having left behind a religion that demanded constant repentance. - Visual~Voice Archives.

Comments

[Wes Roberts]

...and this is also one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems...nice to read it again. I do have a question...Judy got me a treasured Christmas gift...an Anglican rosary...from the National Cathedral in Washington, DC made of purple stones and the Jerusalem cross...something I've longed for for a long time. Could you suggest a good book or two on Anglican prayers that encourages the use of the Anglican rosary? Thank you...and blessings for this day! PS...don't forget...we're still waiting for you and your son to show up in Colorado someday.

[Tim Chesterton]

Come and see those prairies, Maggi.

[Jim Gordon]

One of your previous posts alerted me to Mary Oliver's poetry. Thanks for the nudge -and for this latest reminder of why she is so good at making us aware of our part in the family of things.

[LilyRose]

What a lovely poem. Thanks for that; I might never have run across it but by this odd chance. I can't help but wonder; does the fact of your posting such a gloriously pantheistic poem in this blog speak more of the sensibilities of the Anglican Church, or of this particular blogging Anglican priest...?

[maggi]

thanks, Jim. LilyRose, there's a fine but important distinction between pantheism, pan-en-theism and incarnationalism. Of these three the third is thoroughgoing CHristian orthodoxy, the second is borderline CHristian and the first is not.
I subscribe to the idea that God is in, but also other than the Creation, which makes me incarnationalist but not panthesitic. A thorough grasp of grace, redemption and incarnation (three big Christain doctrines) mean that the language uised to describe a kind and gracious God who is thoroughly at one with the creation sounds a lot like pan-en-theism. But In fact, it's substantially different if you delve into the philosophy/theology that's underneath it. I don't know if Mary Oliver is pantheist or what, but her poetry as I read it has lots to say to Christians who believe in redemption and incarnation, but especially don't like the monster that CHristianity can become when it views God as excessively angry and wrathful