Quote

It is the nature of stone to be satisfied. It is the nature of water to want to be somewhere else.

Mary Oliver

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Mary Oliver
Age: 83 †
Born: 1935
Born: September 10
Died: 2019
Died: January 17
Climate Activist
Novelist
Poet
Writer
Maple Heights
Ohio
Mary Jane Oliver
Else
Nature
Stone
Satisfied
Stones
Somewhere
Water

More quotes by Mary Oliver

Image
The language of the poem is the language of particulars.
Mary Oliver
Image
Don't we all die someday and someday comes all too soon? What will you do with your own wild, glorious chance at this thing we call life.
Mary Oliver
Image
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn? / Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect?
Mary Oliver
Image
And now I understand something so frightening &wonderful- how the mind clings to the road it knows, rushing through crossroads, sticking like lint to the familiar.
Mary Oliver
Image
Poetry is a life-cherishing force.
Mary Oliver
Image
I tell you this to break your heart, by which I mean only that it break open and never close again to the rest of the world.
Mary Oliver
Image
Who do you want to be in your one wild and precious life?
Mary Oliver
Image
Do you cherish your humble and silky life?
Mary Oliver
Image
maybe death isn't darkness, after all, but so much light wrapping itself around us--
Mary Oliver
Image
Today I am altogether without ambition. Where did I get such wisdom?
Mary Oliver
Image
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine
Mary Oliver
Image
Emerson, I am trying to live, as you said we must, the examined life. But there are days I wish there was less in my head to examine, not to speak of the busy heart.
Mary Oliver
Image
You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Mary Oliver
Image
I've always wanted to write poems and nothing else.
Mary Oliver
Image
I worked probably 25 years by myself, just writing and working, not trying to publish much, not giving readings.
Mary Oliver
Image
There were times over the years when life was not easy, but if you're working a few hours a day and you've got a good book to read, and you can go outside to the beach and dig for clams, you're okay.
Mary Oliver
Image
I feel the terror of idleness, like a red thirst. Death isn't just an idea.
Mary Oliver
Image
The god of dirt came up to me many times and said so many wise and delectable things, I lay on the grass listening to his dog voice, frog voice now, he said, and now, and never once mentioned forever from, One or Two Things
Mary Oliver
Image
I consider myself kind of a reporter - one who uses words that are more like music and that have a choreography. I never think of myself as a poet I just get up and write.
Mary Oliver
Image
I believe in kindness. Also in mischief. Also in singing, especially when singing is not necessarily prescribed.
Mary Oliver