Poetry Friday: Wild Gratitude

Today I'm sharing Edward Hirsch's "Wild Gratitude" because I keep learning and relearning what it means to offer praise and thanksgiving. Gratitude doesn't look the same from year to year, month to month, day to day, or even minute to minute. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the gifts that have made their way into my life and other days I'm holding on to gratitude as if it's a gossamer strand I could lose if I blink. Those are the days I most need to sit down with my journal and simpy write, Thank you, thank you, thank you. Oh, and most of all? Thank you. 

 Wild Gratitude

by Edward Hirsch

Tonight when I knelt down next to our cat, Zooey,
And put my fingers into her clean cat’s mouth,
And rubbed her swollen belly that will never know kittens,
And watched her wriggle onto her side, pawing the air,
And listened to her solemn little squeals of delight,
I was thinking about the poet, Christopher Smart,
Who wanted to kneel down and pray without ceasing
In every one of the splintered London streets,

(Read the whole poem at Edward Hirsch's website.)

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Tricia has the Poetry Friday round-up at The Miss Rumphius Effect. 

She and the Poetry Sisters have been up to their usual Amazing-ness. 

Thank you, Poetry Sisters. Thank you, thank you, thank you.