by Mary Oliver
'Of Goodness'
How good
that the clouds travel, as they do,
like the long dresses of the angels
of our imagination,
or gather in storm masses, then break,
with their gifts of replenishment,
and how good
that the trees shelter the patient birds
in their thick leaves,
and how good that in the field
the next morning
red bird frolics again, his throat full of song,
and how good
that the dark ponds, refreshed,
are holding the white cups of the lilies
so that each is an eye that can look upward,
and how good that the little blue-winged teal
comes paddling among them, as cheerful as ever,
and so on, and so on.
