quotes from Zoe

My good friend Zoë has been living in Myanmar since last winter at a meditation center. Ever since she's been there, she sometimes will send me thoughtful poems or fables. She just sent me this one as we were talking about the familiar discussion of "life direction." To work hard or to live simply. To strive to be a top researcher on medical issues or to live in the mountains, enjoy hearing myself and watching other people's lives. I remember talking to a friend about this topic as well (life direction,) and said that part of me wants to just stop everything I've been doing, stop thinking about sad hard topics like how hundreds of thousands of people don't have water and what I can do about it, and do yoga all day instead. I don't mean to down play the importance of yoga--clearly it is something that also has pulled me. Zoë said, Chloë, choose the mountains. I want the mountains and the research and the sad topics with difficult, yet exciting and possible solutions. That's what I love. That's what drives me to apply for grants, study for the GREs, work with doctors who can be so rude they make me cry. I just wish on my walk home everyday I could see the mountains that are just a hundred miles away. Anyway, here's the poem:

My work is loving the world. . .
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young and still not half-perfect? Let me
Keep my mind on what matters,
Which is my work,

Which is mostly standing still and learning to be
Astonished. . .
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,
Which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
And these body-clothes,
A mouth with which to give shouts of joy. . .

-- Mary Oliver