Small Acts

Parallel Press Chapbook Series

by Mary Mercier

"I've always wanted/to do that. Let go of everything/I hold too dear. Become an empty tree./They say/a man once climbed a sycamore/to see eternity." Mary Mercier's poems climb eagerly, reaching beyond literal perception toward larger dimensions. Mercier's aim is not merely close observation, but penetrating vision. In chronicling the "small acts" of geese trumpeting in chorus, an aged woman persisting in her gardening, or searingly blue flowers reappearing in spring, she recognizes underlying spiritual themes: grace, life, death, soul, faith, flight, transformation. For Mercier, such small acts are parables with large intimations. They are "prayer made visible." Watching wild cranes being banded becomes a brush with the elemental: "did you see the wild sky/unfold beneath you? Was flight itself/in your hands?" Migration unfolds as both a native animal instinct and a compelling urge toward deeper knowing: "every living cell feels something pull/and pull until you give it/what it wants-/…anything/to get you there." In a voice wise to the world but not despairing of it, Mercier urges not transcendence but active participation in life's vitality, challenge and transformative possibilities. "Love what may not/love you back/…feeling-not knowing-that/resistance makes flight possible." The issue, she seems to say, is to be present, willing, and ready. Playing it safe, lying low, hiding away - none of these afford glimpses of the wild blue yonder, the larger scope of awareness that is the natural object of endeavor. "One has to be out here if one wants to see/the second coming. The basement/is no place/for revelation."

Chapbook

First published January 1, 2002