#  Marshall Ganz 

 



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##  Marshall Ganz

###  A poem by Mary Oliver:  
  
When death comes  
like the hungry bear in autumn;  
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse  
   
to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;  
when death comes  
like the measle-pox  
   
when death comes  
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,  
   
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:  
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?  
   
And therefore I look upon everything  
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,  
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,  
and I consider eternity as another possibility,  
   
and I think of each life as a flower, as common  
as a field daisy, and as singular,  
   
and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,  
tending, as all music does, toward silence,  
   
and each body a lion of courage, and something  
precious to the earth.  
   
When it's over, I want to say all my life  
I was a bride married to amazement.  
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.  
   
When it's over, I don't want to wonder  
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.  
   
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,  
or full of argument.  
   
I don't want to end up simply having visited this world. 



 



 

 See also:- [ remembrance ](/sid/remembrance)