Soaring with Nancy.

Original illustration by Judith Parsons 2015

Todays blog brought to you by my niece Nancy, (waving) Thank you for commissioning this work.

Mary Oliver’s poem is stunning, I penciled in the words, and read over every single line. As one pens words to reproduce by hand, the words take on their own shape and form. The words step out of their context and become more.

This line: 

“ You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.”

  Walks up to me in person form, this is what my highest self would look like, if she were words.

The poem is amazing. 

Wild Geese

by Mary Oliver

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 your 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.