Going Upstream: Poetic Attention and Religious Resonance

Abstract

The poetry of Mary Oliver is used here as an example of how, for many people who have not encountered religious language or been part of a faith community, poems can have what might be termed a ‘religious resonance’. The poet’s art of attention is identified as a primary tool for replacing the traditional role that religion has played in human communities and consciousness – exploring the sense of life as a gift from a transcendent source, infusing intuitions of meaning into experience and confronting us with ethical demands.