Crista Forest, "First Spring"
Spiritual Sunday – Easter
Alleluia, the Lord is risen!
Here’s a Mary Oliver poem that captures the Easter spirit:
The Fawn
By Mary Oliver
Sunday morning and mellow as precious metal
The church bells rang, but I went
To the woods instead.
A fawn, too new
For fear, rose from the grass
And stood with its spots blazing,
And knowing no way but words,
No trick but music,
I sang to him.
He listened.
His small hooves struck the grass.
Oh what is holiness?
The fawn came closer,
Walked to my hands, to my knees.
I did not touch him.
I only sang, and when the doe came back
Calling out to him dolefully
And he turned and followed her into the trees,
Still I sang,
Not knowing how to end such a joyful text,
Until far off the bells once more tipped and tumbled
And rang through the morning, announcing
The going forth of the blessed.
Note on the artist: The work of Crista Forest can be found at www.forestwildlifeart.com/index.html
3 Comments
Mr. Bates,
Good Morning, and Happy Easter, I love this poem, and have been listening to Mary Oliver on youtube… Thanks you….
Good Day-
Thank you for this lovely poem.
I love how the fawn as well as the people attending the churches leave blessed, by joyful song, holy text.
Blessed Easter. Christ has risen. Alleluia.
One Trackback
[...] When I posted Mary Oliver’s “The Fawn” on Easter Sunday, I became aware, for the first time, just how many of her poems are structured by a Good Friday-Resurrection progression. Although Oliver almost never mentions religion in her works—the church bells in “The Fawn” may be as close as she ever comes—in any number of poems one finds a journey from desolate imagery (forcing oneself through brambles, plodding through a swamp) to sudden, miraculous revelation. [...]