“ Poetry is a life-cherishing force. And it requires a vision-a religion, to utilize an old fashioned term. Yes, so. For verse forms are non words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes allow down to the lost, something every bit necessary as staff of life in the pockets of the hungry. Yes, so. ”

Oliver was born in 1935. She attended both Ohio State University and Vassar College, but ne’er finished a grade. She served as a live-in comrade for several old ages to the ageing sister of poet Edna St. Vincent Millay. During this clip she met photographer Molly Malone Cook, with whom she lived for more than forty old ages, until Cook ‘s decease in 2005 from lung malignant neoplastic disease. Oliver has won many awards for her poesy, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984 for the volume American Primitive and the National Book Award for New and Selected Poems Vol.I. ( Beacon Press )

The natural universe is the focal point of Oliver ‘s poesy. Through sharp observation and attending ( which she likens to prayer ) she writes of the human status as expressed in nature. She writes of birds and lakes, rivers, animate beings, flowers, air current and storms. Throughout the verse forms one feels the hush, wit and magnificence of the out-of-doorss, but is directed besides to believe approximately life as a effect of it. “ There is about Mary Oliver ‘s poesy a deep and marvelous composure-the words are hers, the pleasance ours. ” ( Homer )

Such Singing in the Wild Branches is a poem written in 2003 and is contained in the volume Owls and Other Fantasies. ( pp.8-9 )

It was jumping

and eventually I heard him

among the first leaves-

so I saw him seizing the limb

in an island of shadiness

with his reddish-brown plumes

all spare and neat for the new twelvemonth.

First I stood still

and idea of nil.

Then I was filled with gladness-

and that ‘s when it happened,

when I seemed to drift,

to be, myself, a wing or a tree-

and I began to understand

what the bird was stating,

and the littorals in the glass

stopped

for a pure white minute

while gravitation sprinkled upward

like rain, lifting,

and in fact

it became hard to state merely what it was that was singing-

it was the thrush for certain, but it seemed

non a individual thrush, but himself, and all his brothers,

and besides the trees around them,

every bit good as the glide, long-tailed clouds

in the absolutely bluish sky-all, all of them

were singing.

And, of class, yes, so it seemed

so was I.

Such soft and grave and perfect music does n’t last

for more than a few minutes.

It ‘s one of those charming topographic points wise people

like to speak about.

One of the things they say about it, that is true,

is that, one time you ‘ve been at that place,

you ‘re there everlastingly.

Listen, everyone has a opportunity.

Is it spring, is it forenoon?

Are there trees near you,

and does your ain psyche demand soothing?

Quick, then-open the door and wing on your heavy pess ; the vocal

may already be floating off.

The rubric of this verse form seems a verse form in itself. The usage of the words ‘Such Singing ‘ lets the reader know it is something particular and out of the ordinary that has been experienced. The imagination of wild subdivisions and imagined other-worldly singing produces a unusually graphic mental image before the verse form is even begun. The verse form is written as if Oliver is talking personally to the reader-she is frequently the wanderer/observer in her verse form. She imparts a feeling of shortness of breath and exhilaration in what she is stating. Through the full reading it feels as if she, the talker, is person older and wiser, trying to convert the younger reader to pay attending to life go oning all about. The diction is so simple, direct and pure that the talker does non come off as condescending, but caring.

The verse form begins with short snippings of the full sentence, making the image of the jerked meat hopping of small birds in the surrounding trees, bantam legs ‘clutching the limb ‘ non of a tree, but an ‘island of shadiness ‘ . This creates a mental image of an oasis ; a topographic point for resurgence and refreshment.

Following comes the ‘attention ‘ that Oliver finds really necessary to experience whole. ( as besides displayed in The Real Prayers Are Not the Wordss, but the Attention from New and Selected Poems Vol. II )

First I stood still and idea of nil.

There is a feel of stillness and silence. She so describes a mental metabolisms of going one with her surroundings-a meeting of her psyche with all around her. There is a Nipponese Buddhist term for enlightenment — – satori-this seems to be what Oliver is experiencing-a flash of sudden consciousness ( a measure on the manner to nirvana ) . She becomes the birdcall, the flesh and blood of the animal and sap of the trees. The manner she describes it is therefore:

and the littorals in the glass

stopped

for a pure white minute

I am reminded of Chinese penmanship. The words themselves are ocular. The individual word ‘stopped ‘ creates stress on the word and a interruption in the flow, turning the printed word into the really action it describes. The mysticism is furthered by the words ‘a pure white minute ‘ , which feels like a flash of intense cold/heat, or rousing. Oliver continues depicting her unity with all around her, with the birds and trees, up to the sky and the clouds. It ends with a soft suspiration of initial rhyme:

Such soft and grave and perfect music does n’t last

for more than a few minutes.

She tells us that wise people have ever had cognition of this integrity with nature-to think of nil, to listen and allow the psyche be filled by the thaumaturgy of the universe. Be a portion of the Earth, non separate from the Earth. Once attained and realized, you have the ability for the connexion everlastingly. The verse form ends with bright optimism and exhorts the reader:

Quick, then-open the door and wing on your heavy pess ; the vocal

may already be floating off.

It appears the window of chance may shut at any clip, but if the reader makes hastiness he may besides see a ‘comforting of the psyche ‘ and a flash of enlightenment. He has merely to open his bosom and listen.