A review by adonisroses
New and Selected Poems, Volume One by Mary Oliver

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective

5.0

I am so many!
What is my name?

What is the name
of the deep breath I would take
over and over
for all of us? Call it

whatever you want, it is
happiness, it is another one
of the ways to enter
fire.

i haven’t had my brain rewired by a book in such a long time, and it’s certainly never been rewired by poetry that speaks so strongly of the beauty of life—almost always, the nature of poetry to me has been to articulate pain’s little specificities. mary oliver is the opposite. her poetry speaks to life’s glorious lack of simplicity in the simplest terms. there is no separation between humanity and nature except for the lies we tell ourselves, and yet those lies are tangible as a human in nature, at times. it speaks to me as truth. what beautiful things does the world still have in store for me? i am working very hard to love my life. i can’t wait to revisit her work after i’ve lived more of it.