by Mary Oliver
On roadsides,
in fall fields,
in rumpy bunches,
saffron and orange and pale gold,
in little towers,
soft as mash,
sneeze-bringers and seed-bearers,
full of bees and yellow beads and perfect flowerlets
and orange butterflies.
I don't suppose
much notice comes of it, except for honey,
and how it heartens the heart with its
blank blaze.
I don't suppose anything loves it except, perhaps,
the rocky voids
filled by its dumb dazzle.
For myself,
I was just passing by, when the wind flared
and the blossoms rustled,
and the glittering pandemonium
leaned on me.
I was just minding my own business
when I found myself on their straw hillsides,
citron and butter-colored,
and was happy, and why not?
Are not the difficult labors of our lives
full of dark hours?
And what has consciousness come to anyway, so far,
that is far better than these light-filled bodies?
All day
on their airy backbones
they toss in the wind,
they bend as thought it was natural and godly to bend,
they rise in a stiff sweetness,
in the pure peace of giving
one's gold away.
from Devotions: the Selected Poems of Mary Oliver
Penguin, 2017 
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