Because of the dog’s joyfulness, our own is increased. It is no small gift. It is not the least reason why we should honor as well as love the dog of… - Mary Oliver

What would the world be like without music or rivers or the green and tender grass? Would would this would be like without dogs?

Because of the dog's joyfulness, our own is increased... what would the world be like without music or rivers or the green and tender grass? What would this world be like without dogs?

What would the world be like without music or rivers or the green and tender grass? What would this world be like without dogs?

It does no good to bark at the television,
I said. I’ve tried it too. So he stopped.

Certainly there is within each of us a self that is neither a child, nor a servant of the hours. It is a third self, occasional in some of us, tyrant in others. This self is out of love with the ordinary; it is out of love with time. It has a hunger for eternity.

Landscape

Isn't it plain the sheets of moss, except that
they have no tongues, could lecture
all day if they wanted about

spiritual patience? Isn't it clear
the black oaks along the path are standing
as though they were the most fragile of flowers?

Every morning I walk like this around
the pond, thinking: if the doors of my heart
ever close, I am as good as dead.

Every morning, so far, I'm alive. And now
the crows break off from the rest of the darkness
and burst up into the sky — as though

all night they had thought of what they would like
their lives to be, and imagined
their strong, thick wings.