Morning Walk

By Mary Oliver

Little by little

the ocean

empties its pockets - 

foam and fluff;

and the long, tangled ornateness

of seaweed;

or the whelks,

ribbed or with ivory knobs;

but so knocked about

in the sea's blue hands

and their story is at length only

about the wholeness of destruction - 

they come one by one

to the shore

to the shallows

to the mussel-dappled rocks

to the rise to dryness

to the edge of the town

to offer, to the measure that we will accept it,

this wisdom:

though the hour be whole

though the minute be deep and rich

though the heart be a singer of hot red songs

and the mind be as lightning,

what all the music will come to is nothing,

only the sheets of fog and the fog's blue bell -

you do not believe it now, your are not supposed to,

you do not believe it yet - but you will -

morning by singular morning,

and shell by broken shell.

Blessings,
Roger