Through the Lens Capturing the Marsh Hawk

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On the eve of the publication of her third volumes of poems, Twelve Moons, Archibald Mac Leish (1892-1982) American poet,writer and Librarian of Congress) wrote to Mary Oliver: "You have indeed entered the kingdom. You have done something better than create your own world: you have discovered the world we all live in and do not see and cannot feel."

Mary Oliver's poems reveal new aspects of the world inviting us to pause with her and see and feel them. 

I think Oliver is a master of crafting poems that speak to the beauty that surrounds the coastlines.

 

Marsh Hawk

by Mary Oliver

poem from book of poems Why I Wake Early by Mary Oliver

The marsh hawk

doesn't,

as other hawks do,

work his wings

like soft hinges

to make

progress over

the morning marsh,

but merely

or so it seems,

lays his breast upon the air

and the air, as if understanding,

floats him along

with his wings open,

and raised, just a little

beyond the horizontal-in thanks, perhaps,

to the great crystal carrier

of leaves and clouds-

of everything.

And even though his shadow

follows exactly

his every tilt and flow, and even though

he must know that hunger will win,

he doesn't hurry,

but floats in wide circles

as he gazes

into the marshes below

his hard beak

and the hooks of his feet, as though

wanting something

more lasting than meat.

At noon he's still  there

above the brambles, the grass, the flat water,

where, in their almost stately disengagement,

the incredible dampness and darkness

shine.