This is a small collection of Mary Oliver poems that the poet herself reads. Much of Mary Oliver poetry is like a set of minor meditations of a natural with life being pushed to forefront and the present manifesting. If you give yourself over to her poems, they act as tiny little moments of clarity. It’s much like the Robert Frost definition of poetry, and the effect can be incredibly calming, or at least stilling.
This collection is a single disk audiobook version of the poems, and Mary Oliver is a solid, if not expressive reader, but it fits the words themselves. The recording is also one of clarity. I can’t think of another poet that I’ve nearly as much for making me focus, even if I am not exactly or usually challenged by the words or ideas themselves. They ring entirely true as thoughts and images.
Mindful (by Mary Oliver)
Every day
I see or I hear
something
that more or less
kills me
with delight,
that leaves me
like a needle
in the haystack
of light.
It is what I was born for –
to look, to listen,
to lose myself
inside this soft world –
to instruct myself
over and over
in joy,
and acclamation.
Nor am I talking
about the exceptional,
the fearful, the dreadful,
the very extravagant –
but of the ordinary,
the common, the very drab,
the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself,
how can you help
but grow wise
with such teachings
as these –
the untrimmable light
of the world,
the ocean’s shine,
the prayers that are made
out of grass?
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/At-Blackwater-Pond-Oliver-reads/dp/B005O1YU3S/ref=sr_1_1?crid=URIQKG6HEQET&keywords=at+blackwater+pond+mary+oliver+reads+mary+oliver&qid=1569083006&s=gateway&sprefix=mary+oliver+bla%2Caps%2C136&sr=8-1)