The Wren From Carolina

Just now the wren from Carolina buzzed
through the neighbor’s hedge
a line of grace notes I couldn’t even write down
much less sing. 

Now he lifts his chestnut colored throat
and delivers such a cantering praise—
for what?
For the early morning, the taste of the spider, 

for his small cup of life
that he drinks from every day, knowing it will refill.
All things are inventions of holiness.
Some more rascally than others. 

I’m on that list too,
though I don’t know exactly where.

But, every morning, there’s my own cup of gladness,
and there’s that wren in the hedge, above me, with his

blazing song.

-- Mary Oliver (1935- ), whose birthday is today, from Why I Wake Early: New Poems