Dream Work: Poems

By Mary Oliver

“Dream Work is made up of poems that fulfill the demand of lyric poetry by being short, passionate, charged with emotion and its necessary companion, thought. . . . The music in Oliver’s writing is unmistakable. . . . Dream Work is an outstanding book.” —Los Angeles Times

In this collection of forty-five poems, originally published in 1986, the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver turns her attention to the solitary and difficult labors of the spirit, the parallel awe and destruction that is nature, and the great wonder and struggle of being. Including some of her most well-known poems, such as "Wild Geese" and "The Journey," Dream Work demonstrates the remarkable depth of perceptural awareness that underlies much of Oliver's writing. An expressive exploration of the world and how one fits within it, Oliver's collection is a rich but unflinching meditation on how to exist amid the darkness while always, tirelessly, bending toward the light.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Release date: May 28, 2024
• ISBN: 9780593832684

Mary Oliver

Mary Oliver (1935–2019), one of the most popular and widely honored poets in the U.S., was the author of more than thirty books of poetry and prose. Over the course of her long and illustrious career, she received numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for American Primitive in 1984. Oliver also received the Shelley Memorial Award; a Guggenheim Fellowship; an American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Achievement Award; the Christopher Award and the L.L. Winship/PEN New England Award for House of Light; the National Book Award for New and Selected Poems; a Lannan Foundation Literary Award; and the New England Booksellers Association Award for Literary Excellence. She lived most of her life in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

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Cover for Dream Work, Author, Mary Oliver

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DREAM WORK

Born in a small town in Ohio, Mary Oliver published her first book of poetry in 1963 at the age of twenty-eight. Over the course of her long career, she received numerous awards. Her collection, American Primitive, won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984. She led workshops and held residencies at various colleges and universities, including Bennington College, where she held the Catharine Osgood Foster Chair for Distinguished Teaching. She died in 2019.

SELECT TITLES

ALSO BY MARY OLIVER

poetry

American Primitive

New and Selected Poems: Volume One

White Pine

The Leaf and the Cloud

What Do We Know

Why I Wake Early

New and Selected Poems: Volume Two

Swan

A Thousand Mornings

Dog Songs

Blue Horses

Felicity

Devotions

prose

Blue Pastures

Winter Hours

A Poetry Handbook

Upstream

Book Title, Dream Work, Author, Mary Oliver, Imprint, Penguin Books

PENGUIN BOOKS

An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

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First published in the United States of America by Grove Atlantic 1986

Published in Penguin Books 2024

Copyright © 1986 by NW Orchard LLC

Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Oliver, Mary, 1935–2019, author.

Title: Dream work / Mary Oliver.

Description: First edition. | New York : Penguin Books, 2024.

Identifiers: LCCN 2023052144 (print) | LCCN 2023052145 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593832677 (paperback) | ISBN 9780593832684 (ebook)

Subjects: LCGFT: Poetry.

Classification: LCC PS3565.L5 D74 2024 (print) | LCC PS3565.L5 (ebook) | DDC 811/.54—dc23/eng/20231108

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023052144

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023052145

Ebook ISBN 9780593832684

Cover design: Darren Haggar

Cover photograph: Vicki Jauron, Babylon and Beyond Photography / Getty Images

Designed by Amanda Dewey, adapted for ebook by Molly Jeszke

pid_prh_7.0_148317615_c0_r0

CONTENTS

Part I.

Dogfish

Morning Poem

The Chance to Love Everything

Trilliums

Rage

Wild Geese

Knife

Shadows

Dreams

The River

Consequences

Robert Schumann

Clamming

The Fire

Banyan

Whispers

Driving Through the Wind River Reservation: A Poem of Black Bear

Members of the Tribe

Starfish

The Journey

A

Reviews for Dream Work

[greeniezona · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is only the second full Mary Oliver collection I have read, and it is still somehow a revelation that her poetry isn't just "go watch geese and be happy," which is like, the Cliff's Notes version of Mary Oliver that exists in pop culture, but embraces nature as a balm exactly because it is so weighed down with the tragedies and contradictions and cruelties of life.

Lovely.

[ms_rowse · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Everyone could benefit from reading a little more poetry. Not every poem landed with me, but I'd be reading along and--BAM--two lines would just hit me and make me think about how I interact with the world and myself. Worth it.

[smokler_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I am brand new to reading Mary Oliver. This was a lovely place to start.

[leslie398 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I like Mary Oliver's poetry but for some reason, I found that many of the poems in this volume, especially at the beginning, didn't speak to me. On the whole, I liked the second part of the book best; these poems were more nature-centered.

That being said, poetry for me is very sensitive to my mood so it may be that I would love these poems at some different time.

[danielstj · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was a great, small collection of poetry that won the Pulitzer back in the day. Oliver manages to convey much, and variate her style and meaning, depending on the context and the larger idea of her individual poems. There is much to like here, from the longings to the images and even towards the appeals for greater sanctity. This is not a collection to be missed- it deserves acclaim.

4.25 stars.

[les121 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

School taught me how to read and understand poetry, but it didn't teach me how to enjoy poetry. So when I picked up this book that a friend recommended, it was more out of curiosity than any expectation of enjoyment. To my utter surprise, I found these poems a pleasure to read. They're more accessible than many of the famous poems I've tried reading over the years. You don't get bogged down trying to decipher obscure words and convoluted sentence structure. Instead, you’re free to explore the meaning of the poems, which are thought provoking, intimate, and beautifully vivid. Some poems invite deeper analysis; others just float through my mind and allow me to find my own meaning. If you think you don't like poetry, Dream Work may change your mind. For me, this book was a revelation. I can't wait to discover more amazing poets like Mary Oliver.

[thesmellofbooks · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of the very few poetry books I have read from cover to cover. Each one a treasure. Thank you, Madame Oliver.

[andreablythe · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Beautiful collection of poem that dip into the Oliver personal association with the world around her and with her writing process. She often uses nature to relation to the spiritual or the emotional, drawing out from a deer walking by or sunflowers in a field a deeper meaning about being alive. And then again, sometimes a hawk is just a hawk and a primrose is just a primrose, and its enough to take in their beauty for just a little while.