Reviews with content warning for Animal death - Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver

DNFed @ 44%

Read this for a ‘reading my favorite booktuber’s favorite books of 2023’ challenge (this one being from allisonspaiges’ video), and liked a good amount of the poems but eventually lost interest. I may end up reading a few more but either way I’m marking as a dnf because I won’t be reading every poem.

My favorite poems:
•I don’t want to be demure or respectable (blue horses - 2014)
•on meditating, sort of (blue horses - 2014)
•lonliness (blue horses - 2014)
•do stones feel? (Blue horses - 2014)
•the storm (dog songs - 2013)
•varanasi (a thousand mornings - 2012)
•we shake with joy (evidence - 2009)
•the orchard (red bird - 2008)
•sometimes (red bird - 2008)
•lead (new and selected poems: vol 2 - 2005)
•lingering in happiness (why I wake early - 2004)
•flare (the leaf and the cloud - 2000)
•wild geese (dream work - 1986)

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strewnsunlight's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced

5.0

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lovelymisanthrope's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing

4.0

I picked this up after hearing great things about Mary Oliver's poetry.
"Devotions" is a diverse collection of Mary Oliver's work throughout the duration of her career. The book is divided into chapters, and each chapter is a collection of work from a specific poetry collection from Mary Oliver. The chapters are not necessarily sequential in regard to publication order, but they are assembled to flow together seamlessly if you read the "Devotions" collection front to back.
This collection took me a LONG time to read. I originally started this collection in September, and I did not finish it until December. This is uncommon for me, especially with poetry. This collection reads better when you read a few poems a day rather than trying to devour all of the poems at once. Every time I attempted to read a large amount of the poems in one sitting, I kept becoming distracted. I also think this collection would have been better read in the spring when I could better appreciate nature where I live.
Mary Oliver's writing reminded me greatly of the romantic era of poetry. She writes about loving the natural world around her and appreciating the beauty in nature. I really enjoyed this, and it was a beautiful reminder to appreciate the world around me.
I really enjoyed how this collection is organized, and I really loved that my first taste of Mary Oliver was a collection with a little bit of everything. I felt like I got a great overview of her work, and I have a better idea of what poetry collections I might gravitate towards in the future.
I overall enjoyed this poetry collection, and I would recommend it for anyone who wants to read about the world around them.

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seventhswan's review against another edition

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hopeful inspiring reflective relaxing slow-paced

3.75

In a 400-page book of poetry it would be impossible for every poem to resonate perfectly with me but this was a very strong collection, rooted in the natural world and specifically through a religious lens in many places. Also, swans. Also, lesbianism.

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