Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean— the one who has flung herself out of the grass, the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down— who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes. Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. I don't know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?
—Mary Oliver
During the summers when I was in college, I worked for the OutwardBound School, and Women's Wilderness Institute, taking teenagers on backpacking trips in Washington and Colorado. On each course, I found a time when the hard work of traveling with a backpack was done. I'd have all the students get comfortable, laying down on the earth under the big, blue sky... and I'd read this classic Mary Oliver poem. I go back to that wild and free chapter of my life when I read this poem now... the days when I got to cut myself off from the indoors and the internet for weeks at a time to wander in the mountains. What times of your life feel the most wild and precious?
- watermelon tourmaline
- sterling silver setting, pendant and chain
- 14k gold accent ring at pendant
- 14k gold fill clasp
- 18" chain length
- pendant is 3/4" tall by 5/8" wide