to live in this world you must be able to do three things … - Mary Oliver

" "
to live in this world

you must be able
to do three things
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go

Mary Oliver

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About Mary Oliver

Mary Jane Oliver (10 September 1935 – 17 January 2019) was an American poet who won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize.

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Alternative Names: Mary Jane Oliver

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Originators like Mary Oliver:

William Stafford Rabindranath Tagore Louise Glück Denise Levertov Annie Dillard

Additional quotes by Mary Oliver

Going to Walden is not so easy a thing
As a green visit. It is the slow and difficult
Trick of living, and finding it where you are.

I look upon time as no more than an idea, and I consider eternity as another possibility

Praying

It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

to live in this world you must be able to do three things to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it… - Mary Oliver

About Mary Oliver

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