Dear Friend,

The first part of Mary Oliver’s Long Life is titled, “Flow.” Its sub-sections include “Flow,” “Habits, Differences, and the Light That Abides,” “Poem: Can You Imagine?” and “Three Histories and a Hummingbird.” But, what is flow, according to Oliver? I’m still not sure I know.

My best guess is that what flow means is, being an unresisting part of all things. There’s something Buddhist about her approach to being-in-the-world, a something that I find appealing. When she lists all the wonders she sees, when she looks to diverse relationships as learning experiences, and when she turns to “the natural world” as “the hint of our single and immense divinity–a million unopened fountains,” I find myself feeling very much at home.

Yet, there are times when she describes some terrible things happening, instances of animals stranded, dying, or a situation with her aunt, lonely and wandering, and Oliver repeatedly “does nothing.” There’s a kind of paradox, here. Oliver is a master observer. Part of what makes her poetry and prose so beautiful and striking is that she has the ability to see and describe in ways that are mostly unmatched. But observation as detachment–at the sake of life? Of aid to the suffering? I’m having a hard time wrapping my heart around that.

So, I don’t know, yet, what the flow is supposed to be. It’s poignant that Oliver, in her prose and poem in this section, admits that she’s unable to help. There’s a hint, there, that she thinks she should. There’s a suggestion, maybe, that to be in the flow of the world is to love every bit of it, yes, and to do no harm. But shouldn’t we also aid actively when harm is already in progress?

These first eighteen pages are filled with a touching philosophy, so often phrased in ways that make me want to write them on my skin. I think I could probably start a Book of Quotations and fill it with Oliver’s wisdom alone. I’ll leave one such example from this week’s reading as our meditation this time.

Meditation: “What does it mean . . . that the earth is so beautiful? And what shall I do about it? What is the gift that I should bring to the world? What is the life that I should live?” -Mary Oliver

What is the flow, do you think? Are you in it?

Warmly,

~Adam

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