In Blackwater Woods 
 Look, the trees 
 are turning 
 their own bodies 
 into pillars 
 of light, 
 are giving off the rich 
 fragrance of cinnamon 
 and fulfillment, 
 the long tapers 
 of cattails 
 are bursting and floating away over 
 the blue shoulders 
 of the ponds, 
 and every pond, 
 no matter what its 
 name is, is 
 nameless now. 
 Every year 
 everything 
 I have ever learned 
 in my lifetime 
 leads back to this: the fires 
 and the black river of loss 
 whose other side 
 is salvation, 
 whose meaning 
 none of us will ever know. 
 To live in this world 
 you must be able 
 to do three things: 
 to love what is mortal; 
 to hold it 
 against your bones knowing 
 your own life depends on it; 
 and, when the time comes to let it go, 
 to let it go. 
 What can I say about Mary Oliver's poetry that has not been said a hundred times before? 
 Read it, read it out loud and read it again.