Mindful

Every day
 I see or I hear
  something
   that more or less

kills me
 with delight
  that leaves me
   like a needle.

in the hay stack
 of light.
  It is what I was born for—
   to look, to listen,

to lose myself
 inside this soft world—
  to instruct myself
   over and over

in joy
 and acclamation.
  Nor am I talking
   about the exceptional,

the fearful, the dreadful
 the very extravagant—
  but of the ordinary,
   the common, the very drab,

the daily presentations.
 Oh, good scholar,
  I say to myself,
   how can you help

but grow wise
 with such teachings
  as these—
   the untrimmable light

 of the world,
  the ocean’s shine,
   the prayers that are made
    out of grass?

--Mary Oliver