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"When I was eighty, still doing frequent poetry readings, audiences stood and clapped when I concluded, and kept on clapping until I shushed them. Of course I s
by virtualwhys 8y ago
"When I was eighty, still doing frequent poetry readings, audiences stood and clapped when I concluded, and kept on clapping until I shushed them. Of course I stayed to sign book after book and returned to my hotel understanding that they applauded so much because they would never see me again."
Brings to mind Mary Oliver[0]
"Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?"
[0] http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/133.html http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/133.html
- copperx 8y agoYour quote, for someone that hasn't read that poem, lacks context, and can be interpreted in the opposite way it was intended.
- diN0bot 8y agoThe Summer Day Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean- the one who has flung herself out of the grass, the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down- who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes. Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. I don't know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? —Mary Oliver