Life List von M.C. Blumenthal:
Anyone who has lived long enough
to spot the resplendent quetzal
or the blue-crowned motmot
and even survived to add
the blue morpho butterfly and the
mating dance of the long-tailed manakin
to their life list can number themselves
among the blessed of this earth, as do I
this New Year’s, my wife sleeping
beside me and, back in West Virginia,
our two cats, Bácsi and Néni, no doubt
resting peacefully on the cat sitter’s couch,
and the list of all those I have ever loved
still expanding and every kind of weather
containing its own clemencies and inclemencies
and so, friends, we should suspend
all judgments, even for a day, we
should put down every field guide
and simply number ourselves lucky
to be here, on this mottled, complicated,
mysterious planet, and gaze for a moment
at whatever lies before us, and shower
all our attachments with praise, and call
our own name into the air, and be
grateful for every single sound that
comes back, and love whatever
we can. And then try even harder–
And love, even, what we can’t.