I could only write more true

after reading her words

January 19, 2026—newborn crescent moon in Aquarius

Loves,

Seven years ago on the morning of January 17, 2019 I woke to the news that poet Mary Oliver had died.

Most often the death of a public figure tinges me with sadness for a moment, I register compassion for the folks left behind, then I move on.

But this death? I felt it land like a punch to the chest. I remember gasping and immediately welling with tears as I half-sobbed, “Her words….they’re silenced.”

It felt like a steady ray of truth and clarity had winked out, leaving us—leaving me—in a room suddenly darker.

Breathing space. Sometimes you can see the most amazing things when you look up.

Mary Oliver’s words came into my life a quarter century ago, a gift from a new friend. Oliver had been writing and publishing for twenty years by the time I stood on my front porch, tearing open a surprise package bearing a creamy fabric-covered book with a gold-lettered, deep blue spine.¹

I stood captivated, the front door hanging open, reading poems at random. Her clarion perspective strummed my awareness. Her words played ordinary moments of wood and wild like a great cellist turns bow and strings into Bach.

Mary Oliver’s clarity tuned my own poetic voice. After reading her words, I could only write truer.

Seven years and hundreds of drafts and finished poems later, the anniversary of her death rattles loose two thoughts:

1. I don’t have all the time in the world to write my life into the soil and sand and skies of this world. As timeless as my soul may be, this me, living this life, giving voice to these now experiences? Well, she’s got a time limit. And a ton more poems to write.

2. The way Mary Oliver wrote her life across this world was a north star for me not only as a poet, but as a human. Now that I’m navigating my (rebel) crone years, I feel like I need to quietly pay it forward by making spaces where people can find their own poetic voice.²
   

So, here’s an invitation for you...

• Notice who your Mary Oliver is. Appreciate the gift. Ponder how you might pass it on.

• Notice what you’re putting off. Remember our human lives are finite things. Get started on it.

“Now that I’m free to be myself, who am I?”

Mary Oliver from “Blue Iris”

Noticing with you,

Tracie

1. What Do We Know: Poems and prose poems, 2002. To this day the poems “Wind,” “Blue Iris, “ and “Snowy Night” remain bookmarked from that first ecstatic reading—examples of glorious first lines that grabbed me and wouldn’t let go.

2. I’m opening up space for a few 1-to-1 co-creative collaborations for people in the depths of life or business transition who want to thoughtfully use language to take a path-less-traveled approach to making meaning and perceiving possibilities. These are bespoke transformative experiences we co-create to meet your yearnings at fees I work to keep both equitable and accessible.

Sessions will be available after Imbolc, Feb. 2, 2026. Message me through Substack (or use my contact form) so we can chat about possibilities. Note: this is not therapy. I am not a healthcare provider.