Four Ways of Looking at "Wild Geese"

Ode to Mary Oliver and June 15 workshop invitation.

This essay was originally published in Kripalu Resources and has been edited. Photo by Jon Tyson for Unsplash.

I was deep in Savasana when I first encountered Mary Oliver’s poetry. A wise yoga instructor nudged us from Corpse pose with “Wild Geese,” which begins,

You do not have to be good.

The words pierced something in me. At the time (2009), “good” meant self-sacrificing. Unhappy in my job and in my relationship, I’d escaped from Manhattan to the Berkshires for the weekend to consider new choices. The poem seemed to say, You don’t have to suffer anymore. This was a novel idea.

After class, several geese appeared (!), as if to drive the point home.