"Breakage," by Mary Oliver & "Consider the Lilies of the Sea," by Anne Porter

“Breakage”

I go down to the edge of the sea. 
How everything shines in the morning light! 
The cusp of the whelk, 
the broken cupboard of the clam, 
the opened, blue mussels, 
moon snails, pale pink and barnacle scarred— 
and nothing at all whole or shut, but tattered, split, 
dropped by the gulls onto the gray rocks and all the moisture gone. 
It's like a schoolhouse 
of little words, 
thousands of words. 
First you figure out what each one means by itself, 
the jingle, the periwinkle, the scallop 
       full of moonlight. 

Then you begin, slowly, to read the whole story.

+ Mary Oliver

++++

“Consider the Lilies of the Sea”

Their salt wet life erased, eroded, only
The shells of snails lie on the sand,
Their color darkens toward the whorl’s conclusion,
The center is nearly black. Even the fragments
Faithfully observe their tribal custom
Of involution; the motionless whirlpool
Is clearly written on the broken shield.

The two jointed petals of a small
Tooth-white clamshell stand ajar, and mimic
The opening of wings or of a songbook;
Leaves that a minute and obscure
Death sprung open in a depth of sea;
Held in one’s hand, they still present
The light obedient gesture that let go of time.

And close to these frail, scattered, and abandoned
Carvings which were the armor and the art
Of dark blind jellies that the fish have eaten,
The big Atlantic cumulates and pours,
Flashes, is felled, and streaks among the pebbles
With wildfire foam.

+ Anne Porter

In these late days of summer, here are two poems about the seashore — and in particular, about the apparently infinite number of exquisite gems to be found there, each a home, a work of art, or a fragment of one.

Oliver finds a schoolhouse, and intimations of a grand story, if we are patient and loving and imaginative enough to read it. And Porter — a less famous poet, but equally gifted (a finalist for the National Book Award) — finds the kind of thing Jesus meant when he said, “Consider the lilies.” Don’t worry. Trust God, who loves and cares for you, even when everything seems fragmented, tattered, and split, even as you work like hell to make things come out all right.

“‘Consider the lilies,’” Emily Dickinson said, “is the only commandment I ever obeyed.” Some days, that one is enough. More than enough.