Remembering Mary Oliver
In the closing lines of Mary Oliver’s poem, “October,” from New and Selected Poems, Volume One, the narrator observes that the “glittering” fox coming down the hill hasn’t seen her, adding that “…so this is the world. / I’m not in it. It is beautiful.” At moments like these, her poetry verges on something more than lyricism, approaching the mystical. The new documentary, Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World, directed by Sasha Waters for PBS’s American Masters series, explores Oliver’s art and life, glimpsing a complex figure, a survivor who found a sense of communion in the natural world and refuge in poetry.
Waters’ approach is part reportage, part love letter, mixing Oliver’s personal history with partner Molly Malone Cook in Provincetown, Massachusetts, with recitations of key poems by celebrities such as Stephen Colbert, Oprah Winfrey, Steve Buscemi, and Helena Bonham Carter. As Oliver has said, she had “a very dysfunctional family, and a very hard childhood. So I made a world out of words. And it was my salvation.” This homage adds substantially to our understanding of the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, her circle and her community, providing welcome context in advance of the authorized biography by Lindsay Whalen, to be published by Penguin.
New Books
Nature Matters: Vital Poems from the Global Majority, an anthology edited by Mona Arshi and Karen McCarthy Woolf out of the UK, gathers eco poetry from Asian, African, and Caribbean diaspora voices. (Faber & Faber)
Otherwhere: New & Selected Poems, by Carolyn Forche’, curates five decades of the poet’s work in a landmark volume that World Literature Today has described as “an inimitable, monumental contribution to American Letters.” Bearing witness to global injustice, it transcends boundaries. (Simon & Shuster)
Contests
The C.D. Wright Prize for a single poem will award an emerging poet $1,000 and publication in The Arkansas International. Submit 3-5 unpublished poems by November 15th. See www.arkint.org for details.
Submissions for the Patricia Dobler Poetry Award are open through October 31st. Established in honor of the late Carlow University English professor and poet, the single-poem contest is for woman writers over forty years old who haven’t yet published a full-length collection. Winner will receive $1,000 and round trip transportation to Pittsburgh, lodging, and a reading at Carlow University. See www.carlow.edu for details.
The Treehouse Climate Action Poem Prize is given annually “to honor exceptional poems that help readers recognize the vulnerable state of our environment.” Sponsored by Academy of American Poets and Treehouse Investments, the contest honors four poets with cash prizes, and is open from October 15th to December 15th, 2026. (Free.) See www.poets.org for details.
Poetry Submissions (free or nominal)
Red Cedar Review: until October 15h for emerging writers. www.redcedar-review.com
Penn Review: until November 9th. www.pennreview.org
Pensive Journal: until November 15th. www.pensivejournal.spirituallife.northeastern.edu
