Poetry Thursday ~ The Journey

Today I had the great pleasure of meeting Beansprout in person! What a treat. I so enjoyed being with her smart, sharp, funny, generous, sensitive spirit. And she so beautifully gifted me with a book called Ten Poems to Change Your Life by Roger Housden on this Poetry Thursday. I'll share with you the poem that starts the journey.

The Journey
Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life that you could save