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dream
November 2009 
for Otter
Laura
For Otter, as promised. This poem has meant a lot to me over the years. I was trying to recall the "story" that I wanted to tell you all about it, but I can't remember the exact progression of events. Basically, though, in the summer of 2003 I attended a weeklong conference on Jungian dreamwork and creativity, up in the mountains of North Carolina, not far from Asheville. An amazing week. My mother was there too, though we chose not to room together. A powerful recurrent image and theme for me was that of the white feather. I found them on the lakeside hiking paths where my roommate and I walked and talked, and they subsequently appeared in the mandalas she and I each drew for one of the classes we took. They showed up on the cover of a prominently displayed children's book on snow geese, there in the Kanuga bookstore, and in the dream a man in one of my dreamgroups related, an intensely moving dream about the death of his father and the benediction of a white goose's dreamvisit. Then one of the group facilitators read this poem, and I remember thinking that dreamwork for me is largely about self-acceptance. The belief that I am whole, that I am good enough, that I am worthy of love. Whenever I see a white feather or read this poem that same soft sense of benediction comes over me, and for that moment I am at peace.
Wild Geese
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 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.
© Mary Oliver
Access: Public
That Mary Oliver poem is so beautiful. I love and feel inspired by the line: “You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” In the past I have despaired some of the impulses that have come through this being….not knowing if these impulses are just random impulses in the brain or actual needed impulses. This poem just lets one relax into the loving what one loves. Simple. As for white feathers: they were a reoccurring theme throughout my dreams for many years. Thanks for sharing.
I love the same line as centria. no white feathers as symbols for me though. but I think my dreams are often about self acceptance too.
you only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
ah, what a relief, yes? ;-)
This is one of my all-time-favourites Laura.. thankyou for posting it this morning. The soft animal of my body is tired and aching and looking after boys today … what it loves is to take strength lying down right now ;-)
I loved this laura. thank you. are those hosta?
I think so, Jen. took the photo last summer here in the Jasper city park. I'm so glad you all liked this post. I do love Mary Oliver. Y'all might look up “At Blackwater Pond” too.
I copied/pasted & sent this to someone who I immediately identified it with…..hoping it will make her feel better about “things”!
Thanks Laura…I loved it as well. Made me feel “ok” about myself & my place in life:)
Hope all is well with you…twb
I am quite well. thanks for your comments, twb. : ) I hope your friend likes the poem.
Hi Laura, I finally got on here to read this. It's splendid. I wonder why so many of us fight that “soft animal of our body.” I think if we were all truly in tune with it, the world would be a very gentle place to be … .half of us would be napping, and the other half would be running, and most of us we get to see a lot more sunrises and sunsets too. I suspect there would be a lot fewer people diagnosed with depression. Thanks for this. It's lovely.
'…. what is that beautiful thing that just happened?' … thankyou :-) x
You're very welcome, Otter. Lynx, yes yes! : )
Yes! One can never hear/read/see/experience that poem too much. People always seem to connect with it on such a visceral (soft animal) level… it may just be the most quoted poem in the English language…
In my 'Magic Circle' it is accompanied by this saying, attributed to the Ojibwa:
Sometimes I go about in pity for myself,
and all the while a great wind is bearing me across the sky.
And, poking through my database, I find this quote, from the movie Illuminata:
I go on the wind like someone who knows his way
Though in my heart I'm only obeying a voice
That carries me forward, always forward
What will I find at the end of such a life?
Perhaps the secret sweetness of having obeyed my fate…
Also came across this something new…
and this something old (another Mary Oliver favorite)
Blessings to all as we discover our trackless paths…
Thank you Laura. I love this poem a new treasure!
Tsuya, glad you liked this. thanks for 'who paves the path?' and The Journey. I love that poem. here's something else for you all by Oliver:
Reckless Poem
Today again I am hardly myself.
It happens over and over.
It is heaven sent.
It flows through me
like the blue wave.
Green leaves—you may believe this or not—
have once or twice
burst from the tip of my fingers
somewhere
deep in the woods,
in the reckless seizure of spring.
Though, of course, I also know that other song,
the sweet passion of one-ness.
Just yesterday I watched an ant crossing a path, through the tumbled pine needles as she toiled.
And I thought: she will never live another life but this one.
And I thought: if she lives her life with all ther strength is she not wonderful and wise?
And I continued this up the miraculous pyramid of everything until I came to myself.
And still, even in these northern woods, on these hills of sand
I have flown from the window of myself
to become white heron, gray whale, fox, hedgehog, camel.
Oh, sometimes already my body has felt like the body of a flower!
Sometimes already my heart is a red parrot, perched
among strange, dark trees, flapping and screaming.
sometimes already……… so full. :-)