Heron Rises from the Dark, Summer Pond (Mary Oliver)

So heavy 

is the long-necked, long-bodied heron, 

always it is a surprise 

when her smoke-colored wings 

open 

and she turns 

from the thick water, 

from the black sticks 

of the summer pond, 

and slowly 

rises into the air 

and is gone. 

Then, not for the first or the last time, 

I take the deep breath 

of happiness, and I think 

how unlikely it is 

that death is a hole in the ground, 

how improbable 

that ascension is not possible, 

though everything seems so inert, so nailed 

back into itself— 

the muskrat and his lumpy lodge, 

the turtle, 

the fallen gate. 

And especially it is wonderful 

that the summers are long 

and the ponds so dark and so many, 

and therefore it isn’t a miracle 

but the common thing, 

this decision, 

this trailing of the long legs in the water, 

this opening up of the heavy body 

into a new life:  see how the sudden 

gray-blue sheets of her wings 

strive toward the wind; see how the clasp of nothing
                  takes her in. 

--Mary Oliver

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