Mary Oliver wrote this poem about being an early riser and what it can mean. I used to fight the alarm clock, turn over several times, and hit the snooze button. With age, I realized that 5:00 or 5:30 AM was the time my body wanted my mind to join it and begin the day. I eat breakfast quietly, go for a cup of tea, and reflect. I do all of this in solitude. Even the busiest Starbucks at 6:00 AM, is quiet. I find many of the things that make the day worth facing in that quiet and solitude. I find creative space there.
Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who made the morning
and spread it over the fields
and into the faces of the tulips
and the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even, the
miserable and the crotchety –
best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-darkness,
to ease us with warm touching,
to hold us in the great hands of light –
good morning, good morning, good morning.
Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness.
About ivonprefontaine
In keeping with bell hooks and Noam Chomsky, I consider myself a public and dissident intellectual. Part of my work is to move beyond (transcend) institutional dogmas that bind me to defend freedom, raising my voice to be heard on behalf of those who seek equity and justice in all their forms.
I completed my PhD in Philosophy of Leadership Studies at Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA. My dissertation and research was how teachers experience becoming teachers and their role as leaders.
I focus on leading, communicating, and innovating in organizations. This includes mindfuful servant-leadership, World Cafe events, Appreciative Inquiry, and expressing one's self through creativity. I offer retreats, workshops, and presentations that can be tailored to your organzations specific needs.
I published peer reviewed articles about schools as learning organizations, currere as an ethical pursuit, and hope as an essential element of adult eductaion. I published three poems and am currently preparing my poetry to publish as an anthology of poetry.
I present on mindful leadership, servant leadership, schools as learning organizations, how teachers experience becoming teachers, assessement, and critical thinking. I facilitate mindfulness, hospitality retreats. and World Cafe Events using Appreciative Inquiry.
I am writing and researching about various forms of leadership, how teachers inform and form their identity as a particular teacher, schools as learning organizations, hope, nonviolence and its anticipatory relationship with the future, as essential elements to teaching and learning.
Academic publications can be found at Ivon Gile Prefontaine on ResearchGate
ivonprefontaine
Teacher as Transformer 
I love 5:30 a.m. I just wish most stores would open before 8 or 9 a.m. 😉
Yes, life still goes on.
I am up at 5:30 am also even with a work at home, make my own schedule job. I love the quiet , the feeling that no one else is up and then KaBoom – it is over before I know it. I am also a firm believer in kindness; first to ones self.
Kindness begins from within. I find I am kinder today with the early time to myself.
I agree. I’m a early riser as well. It is my quite time. Love the poem.
BE ENCOURAGED! BE BLESSED!
Thank you Francine.
In some ways, I would love to be a morning person, and I could probably train myself to be, but still, I love the night.
My wife does not even fight the night person. I used to stay up, but just cannot any longer. We are who we are.
It is amazing that no matter what time I go to bed, I always wake up early!
My uncle used to say there was an internal alarm clock and it went off each morning. I am finding that as I get older.
This is a much more encouraging way to think of my early mornings! Nice post 🙂
Lily
Thank you Lily. I agree. I used to fight getting up and it did not get my day off well.
I am up right around 5 or 6 every day. It’s before the day is even awake, & as if the dawn is happening for an audience of one…and gratitude “for the dear star where you are’….yesssss. Good everything about poem…
Lovely sentiment; before the day is awake. We get to greet it as it arrives.
I love Mary Oliver’s poems – thanks for sharing. I hadn’t seen this one before.
I used to love getting up early, but it’s too hard when I can’t take a nap in the afternoon. I do better at work if I don’t get up too early.
Nancy
I know the issue. They won’t let me nap at work either. My students did suggest the other day we should have a short afternoon nap, but I don’t know how that would go over.
The poem is from a fairly recent book of the same title.
Yes I love to raise and open my bedroom curtains just before sun raise to see the sun peep it’s yellow ball over the horizon. It is a nice feeling as well as view.
Thanks for the visit to my blog, Savor the Food. I hope you will return as we would appreciate your comments and readership.
Chef Randall
savorthefood.wordpress.com
You are welcome Randall. Thank you for stopping by and commenting. That is a lovely image you present with the opening of curtains and the sun peeping over the horizon.
This is so encouraging and delightful. What a glorious way to start the day.
It truly is.
Ivon, please email me at claireobrien23@gmail.com. Just a very quick question. Thanks.
I love the poem, and I love good mornings. My day begins at 5.30 am. In the tropics sometimes 5.30 am is bright and sunny and some times dark. what ever is 5.30, it is perfect for my morning walks. 🙂
I look forward to summer when our Canadian days lengthen. I can get out and walk more frequently. It provides a time to set the day ahead or reflect on the day just passed.
Perfect! 🙂
A fellow early-riser…And one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems. I hope all your days start peacefully and every day be marked with as much kindness directed at you as you give to all..
Thank you for the kind words Mimi.
A morning person myself, I crawl out of bed,responding to the creative prowess in me, to rise and write. This can occur anytime after 3 a.m., mostly it happens around 4:30, though today was more sluggish. I love this cheerful poem, it has brightened my day!
I find Mary Oliver’s poetry a refreshing way to begin the day and end it as well. She is such an optimist.
Though her poem is a bit too over the top sweetness for my tastes, I agree with your premise–I get up anywhere between 2:30 and 5 AM every morning and after feeding the circus animals their just rewards strap myself into my writing chair and ‘let the games begin–Caesar, we who are about to die salute you!>KB
The quiet, the early rising, and routine are the space many of us seem to need.
I don’t mind 5:30am. But – I prefer it in the days of summer.
Sometimes Canadian winters are harder to get going at 5:30. My engine does not run at minus 30 in the dark quite as well.
You’ve been given the Versatile Blogger Award! http://misbehavedwoman.wordpress.com/2013/03/07/versatile-blogger-award/
Thanks for always making such thoughtful and uplifting posts – I truly enjoy your blog 🙂
Thank you on both counts. It is appreciated.
Beautiful and wise. And love Mary Oliver’s luminous work. Thank you for the gentle, thoughtful, inspiring post.
You are welcome. There is no such thing as a bad poem, but Mary Oliver is a poet who only writes great poems. I live in them and find a space in her words so easily. The thing I enjoy the most is I am not alone in loving her poetry. There is a great community.
Love this poem!
He has a way of speaking to a person with his words and getting our attention.
My early mornings starts at the best at 6:30 for a “not a morning person” not to bad at all. I do also find a lot of joy getting started while it is still kind of quiet out there and I am kind of proude to honor the day by getting up earlier….
I like the words at the end: honor the day. That is so appropriate.
Getting up early starts a good day well. The problem is getting to sleep early and staying asleep.
I empathize with those last two points.
my shift ends at 1am…but I am still up to watch the day begin..usually long before the sun does
always been an early riser…I like the breath of the morning air….
I really enjoyed this one…
Thank you for sharing and always stopping by to read my thoughts
you are very kind to do so…
Take Care…
You Matter…
)0(
ladyblue
Thank you for the wonderful comment. It is much appreciated.
There is something quietly magical about early morning. Those few moments when the rising sun is still behind the mountains silhouetting them deep blue. It raises high in the sky and the moment is gone. You have been rewarded. Virginia
You just described one of my mornings last summer as I stood looking out to the Rockies across a golf course in Pincher Creek Alberta. I watched deer arrive, eat, and depart. It set the day for me. Thank you for the beautiful comment.
I am now living on the other side of the Rockies (the lower mainland Vancouver) but years ago I lived in Calgary and enjoyed the same amazing mountain views at sunset. Virginia
I lived in Nelson for a couple of years and played hockey. It is a different set of mountains, but they are all so beautiful and add something to the terrain.
I agree with the poem. Good to awake early and enjoy the day. Thank you for the excellent poetry.
You are welcome John. Thank you for stopping by.
I’ve tried so hard to be a morning person … but alas …. my inner alarm clock doesn’t like mornings. But I feel much the same joy in night time as you seem to find in the a.m. Solitude, time to think… plus no nagging thoughts about housework or things that ‘ need” to be done. I love ending the day in peace and feeling that things might not have started well… but they sure ended on a great note! But … sometimes… how I envy morning people. Great post! Hope you don’t mind my notes….
Jen, I enjoyed your notes. We are all wired a little differently and the diversity makes life much more interesting. Thank you for your kind words.
Well stated poem. Well explained the morning features of weather and it’s breeze.
Right from my childhood I have been accustomed to wake up early in the morning between
5 a.m.// 5:30 a.m.. The starts with that cool air and all the day’s work can be ended with all
peace, I feel.
Excellent post.
Thank you Lvsrao.
What a lovely poem. Yes, I usually hate getting up early. But your poem inspires me to be thankful for the beauty and solitude of greeting each new day with a smile! THANKS, Ivon.
You are welcome Bette. It is good to hear from you.
Reblogged this on lost creek publishing.
Thank you for the re-blog. It is greatly appreciated.
I am also an earlier riser and if I lay there or drift back off, it always leads to nervous thoughts or bad dreams. Get up & ease into your day! Early risers unite!
I agree. We need to unite. I find the same thing. Since I have begun to get up earlier, I find the day is easy to work with as difficult as it might end up being.