Afraid of Nothing in White River Country

I've somehow found myself in a rustic cabin on the North Fork of the White River near Meeker, Colorado for a few days. The cabin I'm in sits right on the river and has that charm of years past—knotty pine walls, hardwood floors—all under huge cottonwoods and with frequent wildlife visitors. It was built by the Eleanor and F.D. Roosevelt family in years past.

There's no cell or internet service, so I'm writing this from the town of Craig, where I'll have lunch with a friend today. I hope to have some interesting posts when I get back to the desert. Until then, I'd like to share one of the coolest poems ever, by Mary Oliver.

Starlings in Winter

Chunky and noisy,
but with stars in their black feathers,
they spring from the telephone wire
and instantly

they are acrobats
in the freezing wind.
And now, in the theater of air,
they swing over buildings,

dipping and rising;
they float like one stippled star
that opens,
becomes for a moment fragmented,

then closes again;
and you watch
and you try
but you simply can’t imagine

how they do it
with no articulated instruction, no pause,
only the silent confirmation
that they are this notable thing,

this wheel of many parts, that can rise and spin
over and over again,
full of gorgeous life.

Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us,
even in the leafless winter,
even in the ashy city.
I am thinking now
of grief, and of getting past it;

I feel my boots
trying to leave the ground,
I feel my heart
pumping hard. I want

to think again of dangerous and noble things.
I want to be light and frolicsome.
I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,
as though I had wings.

~ Mary Oliver ~