letters to form

form is certainty (inspired by mary oliver)

May 26, 2025

“Form is certainty. All nature knows this, and we have no greater adviser. Clouds have forms, porous and shape-shifting, bumptious, fleecy. They are what clouds need to be, to be clouds. See a flock of them come, on the sled of the wind, all kneeling above the blue sea. And in the blue water, see the dolphin built to leap, the sea mouse skittering; see the ropy kelp with its air-filled bladders tugging it upward; see the albatross floating day after day on its three-jointed wings. Each form sets a tone, enables a destiny, strikes a note in the universe unlike any other. How can we ever stop looking? How can we ever turn away?”

— Mary Oliver, from Upstream

My form is muscles, sinewy, stretching, growing and shrinking muscles. My form is blood, pump pump pumping through my vessels. My form is bones, aching and singing. My form is flesh, ripping, tearing, mending, flexible flesh. My form is my heart, physical and sentimental, here and there, beating and watching. My form is limbs, and my fingers, and my knees, and my elbows. My form is brain and mind, the same, and also the opposite, with neurons and synapses and thoughts and debates. My form is the scratch of fingernails and the bite of teeth on lower lips. My form is the taste of the food grown by farmers (hopefully) or forced labor (unfortunately). My form is the sight of the lush bustles of leaves and vibrant reds of roses, but also of pollution and violence — and it is also the sight of feet as I avert my gaze from another’s, timid at best, fearful at worst, so I do not have to make a connection. My form is needing connection and hiding from it.

My form is wholly me and entirely you, none of us and all of us.

My form is my fingerprints leaving her marks on everything I touch. My form is breath filling up my chest, the same chest I used to wish was more, more, more. My form is the way I wasn’t enough until the day I felt I as too big. My form is the way I try to shrink for you. My form is the way words form on my tongue, and also the way they go back down my throat. My form is laughter. My form is crying. My form is the way that I never could do one without the other. My form is having once been in a womb, and my form is my own womb. My form is the burden of having a womb, a beautiful joy and a terrible punishment. My form is the way my womb is mine and mine alone, but others think it is theirs. My form is anger, and sorrow, and gratitude, and radiance, and indecision.

My form is cursing and casting spells, both on purpose and on accident. My form is looking directly into the sun. My form is standing naked under the full moon, except on the eclipse. My form is sweat, pooling on my eyelashes until it burns, but I keep looking anyway. My form is the view of eyelids, closed, and lights dancing on a canvas of dark pink. My form is blood from between my legs, swirling down the drain, a miracle because it means I am not carrying a miracle. My form is never wanting to become a mother. My form is smiling and nodding when people say I would be a good mother. My form is my mother breaking my heart, and me breaking hers. My form a signature on cards, Love, Sam. My form is equal parts inspired and also devastated at the actions of others. My form is hot tea I drink and cold water I splash. My form is raindrops on my tongue as I lap them into my mouth.

There are the stubborn stumps of shame, grief that remains unsolvable after all the years, a bag of stones that goes with one wherever one goes and however the hour may call for dancing and for light feet. energies of the world, better than anger, better than bitterness and, because more interesting, more alleviating. And there is the thing that one does, the needle one plies, the work, and within that work a chance to take thoughts that are hot and formless and to place them slowly and with meticulous effort into some shapely heat-retaining form, even as the gods, or nature, or the soundless wheels of time have made forms all across the soft, curved universe—that is to say, having chosen to claim my life, I have made for myself, out of work and love, a handsome life.

— Mary Oliver, from Upstream

My form has been given to me, forced onto to me, gifted to me, stolen from me, pried from me, changed by me, and claimed by me. My form is life I cursed, at first, and my form is life I have created, through work. My form is work that made my back nearly snap, my form is work that made my heart open. My form is my heart closing, but also the way it opens again, over and over. My form is life I have created, through love. My form is the effort that learning love takes — my form is the discovery that love is the migration of doves, beautiful but never stagnant. My form is love that can never be captured, only released.

My form is waking up, even when I wish to sleep forever. My form is trying again, even when the wound is still bleeding. My form is that I fail, and I fail, and I fail. My form is thinking I understand, and then realizing I don’t. My form is beliefs that are clouds changing shape, then bursting open.

Form is certainty, form is not constant. Form is certainty, form is not predictable. Form is certainty, form is not impossible to change.

I choose my form, and also, I surrender to it.

I claim it, and also, I understand I do not own it.

I am formless, and my formlessness creates shape.

To be made of form is to let form make me.

I may not understand my form (for, when I think that I do, I am reminded that I most definitely do not), but I learn from it,

Formless day after formless day,

Forming my life.