Softest of mornings, hello.

And what will you do today, I wonder,

to my heart?

And how much honey can the heart stand, I wonder,

before it must break?

This is trivial, or nothing: asnail

climbing a trellis of leaves

and the blue trumpets of its flowers.

No doubt clocks are ticking loudly

all over the world.

I don’t hear them. The snail’s pale horns

extend and wave this way and that

as her finger-body shuffles forward, leaving behind

the silvery path of her slime.

Oh softest of mornings, how shall I break this?

How shall I move away from the snail, and the flowers?

How shall I go on, with my introspective and ambitious life?

Mary Oliver