The wild geese

Last night I was tired,  my feet were swollen and I was ready to get in bed and read. I came into our room and there on the bed was a whole pile of laundry that the hubbs had folded and distributed (bless his heart).  I told myself that I should put the clean clothes away before I went to bed and then the first 3 sentences of this poem came to my mind.

Wild Geese

by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes, 

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, 

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting  

over and over announcing your place 

in the family of things.

And that is true.  After a long day of parks and bike rides and friends and races sometimes you just have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.  And if that happens to be stealing every pillow in the house and tucking them around your body while you read detective novels, so be it.