Mary Oliver’s ‘Good-Bye Fox’

I am the grateful recipient, earlier this week of Mary Oliver’s poetry collection A Thousand Mornings. Thank you to my friend Tim Farrelly – not sure what I did to deserve this, but I can’t believe I was unfamiliar with this poet. As soon as I cracked the book, I was entranced. Oliver died in 2019, aged 83 and I gather I was almost alone in the world in not knowing her work. 

I have read and re-read her poem ‘Good-Bye Fox’ and I just knew that I had to unite it with photographs of our beloved Ferdia, about whom I wrote in this post, and Robert wrote in this one. I have applied for and been given permission to quote this wonderful poem in full.* So first, here it is.

Good-Bye Fox

He was lying under a tree, licking up the shade, 

Hello again, Fox, I said. 

 And hello to you too, said Fox, looking up and not bounding away. 

 You’re not running away? I said. 

Well, I’ve heard of your conversation about us. News travels even among foxes, as you might know or not know. 

 What conversation do you mean? 

 Some lady said to you, “The hunt is good for the fox.” And you said, “Which fox?” 

 Yes, I remember. She was huffed. 

 So you’re okay in my book. 

 Your book! That was in my book, that’s the difference between us. 

 Yes, I agree. You fuss over life with your clever words, mulling and chewing on its meaning, while we just live it. 

 Oh! 

Could anyone figure it out, to a finality? So why spend so much time trying. You fuss, we live. 

And he stood, slowly, for he was old now, and ambled away. 

I found myself mulling and chewing over what Oliver is saying and contrasting it with my experiences with Ferdia.

The poem’s central dynamic — a fox who just lives while the poet fusses with words and meaning — relates closely to our relationship with Ferdia. Robert and I were doing exactly what Oliver’s fox gently mocks: writing, naming, observing. 

And yet. . . Ferdia seemed to choose our company. He came back, repeatedly, voluntarily. That kinda complicates Oliver’s characterisation of the fox as loftily above our interest in him.

For me, it’s not just about a fox. It’s also about loss, and what endures in memory. 

But I don’t have to rely just on memory, because we were recording, we were mulling and chewing over his presence in our lives. And we were loving it all – how he wore a rut in the lawn to our terrace, how he barked gently outside the window to alert us to his presence, how he carried scraps home to his family, how he loved to keep us company as we sat outside, and how much he liked it when Robert played his melodeon. 

Ferdia ambled away in the end. I am so grateful we fussed over him while we could.

*With many thanks: Reprinted by the permission of The Charlotte Sheedy Literary Agency as agent for the author. Copyright © 2012 by Mary Oliver with permission of Bill Reichblum

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18 thoughts

  3. Hi Finola

    I’m glad you’ve discovered Mary Oliver! I love Wild Geese and The Summer Day (along with 100s of other people!).

    Your photos of your beloved Ferdia are so moving – thank you for sharing. That must have been such a special relationship.

    Vivien xx

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  4. Totally entrancing. Who can forget the “foxy-whistered gentleman” in the story of Jemima Puddleduck by Beatrix Potter, or of Rufus in Wild Lone by BB. Mankind has not always been kind to the fox , but I see that there is currently a renewed campaign to ban fox-hunting in Ireland which is some progress. I watched a fox in a garden in Cappaghglass the night before last – perhaps a relation to Ferdia !

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    • A grandson, or great-grandson, maybe. Apparently a national poll found 72% of the Irish public support a ban on fox hunting yet the Dáil voted overwhelmingly against one just a few months ago.

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  5. And you know who I’m thinking of now. What pleasure Fineen gave us – nothing lofty about her! She too seemed to take tremendous pleasure in just being with us. Lovely to see those pix of Ferdia again, especially with Robert playing his melodeon. I’m a big fan of Mary Oliver, somehow she seems, like Seamus Heaney, to have a poem for everything.

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  6. How wonderful when a native animal simply takes you as part of the environment, a fellow inhabitant, just something else in life, not a threat, not something which is a bother, simply something else in life, living together.

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