Tuesday, March 15, 2011

My religion


The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

--- Wendell Berry

(I stumbled across this poem and it really resonated with me. The photo is of intellikid at Roan Mountain Bald, around 10 years ago.)

13 comments:

  1. A beautiful poem.
    A beautiful thought.
    A beautiful photograph of a beautiful child.

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  2. Ha. You are definitely a whip!

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  3. True...that's often been Sade of me.

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  4. I'm not surprised. But now I think we should leave this topic behind us.

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  5. Ahhhh. The peace of the wild things as only Wendell Berry can capture it. Absolutely love this man. Think I'll C&P into Word and print it out in order to always have it in front of me. Beautiful photo and perfect for this piece.

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  6. tnlib, I wasn't eloquent enough to have a suitable comment for your "bloggy wobbly blues" post the other day, so I'm glad you saw & liked this!

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  7. Beautiful poem. I'm glad you identified the photo. When I first saw it I thought of Grayson Highlands in Virginia.

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  8. Ah, that heavenly top of the Smoky world. It makes for long thoughts.

    I'm copying this poem for my Poetry page. To find the world Berry describes, I have only to walk out my back door, take a dozen steps or so, and lie down. I've never done that, but I might now.

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  9. Mr. C - when I saw your photos of the Grayson Highlands a while back, I thought of Roan Mtn :-)

    Nance - hope you had a good lie down!

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