I have a notebook with me all the time, and I begin scribbling a few words. When things are going well, the walk does not get anywhere; I finally just stop and write.
Category Archive: Mary Oliver
Poetry isn’t a profession, it’s a way of life. It’s an empty basket; you put your life into it and make something out of that.
Writers must… take care of the sensibility that houses the possibility of poems.
It’s very important to write things down instantly, or you can lose the way you were thinking out a line. I have a rule that if I wake up at 3 in the morning and think of something, I write it down. I can’t wait until morning – it’ll be gone.
As a child, what captivated me was reading the poems myself and realizing that there was a world without material substance which was nevertheless as alive as any other.
I worked probably 25 years by myself, just writing and working, not trying to publish much, not giving readings.
The woods that I loved as a child are entirely gone. The woods that I loved as a young adult are gone. The woods that most recently I walked in are not gone, but they’re full of bicycle trails.
Poetry is one of the ancient arts, and it began as did all the fine arts, within the original wilderness of the earth.
Words have not only a definition… but also the felt quality of their own kind of sound.
My first two books are out of print and, okay, they can sleep there comfortably. It’s early work, derivative work.