Paying Attention--through the Eyes of Oliver and Robinson
Mary Oliver says in her poem “The Summer Day”:
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With you one wild and precious life?
It strikes me that this “paying attention” is one of the chief parts of praise—and prayer, as Oliver suggests. Marilyn Robinson’s central character in Gilead, Pastor John Ames, also pays attention, and while Oliver pays attention to the natural world, Pastor Ames, again and again, finds the behavior of people a source of delight and praise. He says,
“When people come to speak to me, whatever they say, I am struck by a kind of incandescence in them, the “I” whose predicate can be “love” or “fear” or “want,” and whose object can be “someone” or “nothing” and it won’t really matter, because the loveliness is just in that presence, shaped around “I” like a flame on a wick, emanating itself in grief and guilt and joy and whatever else. But quick, and avid, and resourceful. To see that aspect of life is a privilege of the ministry which is seldom mentioned.”
The person who wrote this, Marilyn Robinson, pays attention. She sees, in the earnest desires and concerns of an individual, something beautiful and remarkable, life as intense and hot as a fire. And I dare say she sees it as a manifestation of the divine in each person, the image of God. At least that’s how I see it.
What will I do with my wild and precious life today? Rake leaves. Visit an invalid friend. And pay attention, look for the loveliness that flows from the creator.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With you one wild and precious life?
It strikes me that this “paying attention” is one of the chief parts of praise—and prayer, as Oliver suggests. Marilyn Robinson’s central character in Gilead, Pastor John Ames, also pays attention, and while Oliver pays attention to the natural world, Pastor Ames, again and again, finds the behavior of people a source of delight and praise. He says,
“When people come to speak to me, whatever they say, I am struck by a kind of incandescence in them, the “I” whose predicate can be “love” or “fear” or “want,” and whose object can be “someone” or “nothing” and it won’t really matter, because the loveliness is just in that presence, shaped around “I” like a flame on a wick, emanating itself in grief and guilt and joy and whatever else. But quick, and avid, and resourceful. To see that aspect of life is a privilege of the ministry which is seldom mentioned.”
The person who wrote this, Marilyn Robinson, pays attention. She sees, in the earnest desires and concerns of an individual, something beautiful and remarkable, life as intense and hot as a fire. And I dare say she sees it as a manifestation of the divine in each person, the image of God. At least that’s how I see it.
What will I do with my wild and precious life today? Rake leaves. Visit an invalid friend. And pay attention, look for the loveliness that flows from the creator.
Comments
Post a Comment