The Peace of Wild Things By Wendell Berry


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.

in your poetic journey
you may meet poets
who are taller
and seem mysterious
and you may not understand
their magic.

their words
may be taller
than you can reach.

go back to them.

if they are worth
their salt,
they will take your hand
and walk you through
their lines.

you will grow.

the best poetry
carries our essence
out to greet the world.

the best poems
are conversation.

Spent the afternoon
In bed
On my regular
Scheduled
Day off.

Kept dreaming
That people
Were trying to
**** me.

My folks
Are saying
I don't look good.

Maybe tomorrow
Will be better

First there is this: 

sentience 
echoes of a pounding heart
un-asked for dread 
looking to the sky for answers 
one ear to the ground 
a natural alliance 
in intangible connections. 

The amethyst beneath
distressed wood
and chipping paint 
stubborn in its design 
Buddhist expressions 
listening for enlightenment 
the package of unity
found on this door step 
inexplicably
dissolves everything 
into itself 

Then the words: 

your voice sinks deep 
like gravity as it applies to heat 
and then a skipped space

and:

walking that line 
where the crack in the sidewalk
nurtures your vibe 
must have been something
we were talking about
whatever day it was. . .
Hidden designs lodged into our psyche 
Others may have seen it before
we did but it's hard to say 

and then: 

I give you my voice 
and we tiptoe around what can't be said. 
You watch me turn this into a dance 
& sigh reminiscent 
And I talk lullabies in hillbilly drawl. 
Conversations long to stretch themselves thin 
Patience.. We pass each other
shift-work. 
Stories and thoughts become play time
I take over and you catch some zzzz's. 
How can this be? 
and How can it not?
final thoughts.. for tonight at least

She’s not as genuine as cubic zirconia

or Christmas tree tinsel.

Her life may be one large web

littered with duty and lies.

But she smiles convincingly

and attends to the avoidable

and carries herself

as if all is well under the fragile façade.

Don’t ask her for honesty.

She could no more move the moon

than she could tell you the thing

you wouldn’t want to hear.

Don't think she doesn't grieve

when someone pulls at the scab of her reality.

There are, after all,

two sides to every story.

And if she wants to be a chameleon

in a changing, scary world
shouldn't we pretend like we can't see?

I have to admit,
I never pondered the mysteries
Of cornbread.

Mammaw fried hers
In the iron griddle
So thin and light
It tasted like
Sweet, starched lace.

Evenings like these
I regret
I never had her light touch.

Sunshine
Floated
On that griddle.

Her kitchen table
Was a magic place
I wish
I could take you there

Dream with me
We will neither one
Be hungry, thirsty or alone
Any more

I will heal you,

he said.

My words of grace

will ease your aches.

My inner light

will guide you home.

My patient hands

will soothe your spirit.

I am all that you need.*

But I wonder

if his words have grace.

And I wonder

if his hands are patient.

And I wonder

if his light will shine.

And I wonder

if I am all that he needs.

I haven't seen
So many angels
Hiding
In the clouds
Since John died.

They seem to be
Equipped for war.

Necesito
Todo
Los angeles.

My heart is heavy.

I am impatient
Too often
With conversations
These days

And i can't
Say the reason
Out loud

But if a body
Could hear
The conversation
Going on in
My brain

Well, I guess,
It might make
More sense.

He thinks I'm magic
as if my voice
has power
to pull him from
the dark abyss.

I think it must be trickery,
sleight of hand,
magnetism,
trap doors even.

These hands
hold no enchantment.

This heart
knows no spell.

Still, I would beguile
the moon from the sky
if heaven's light
would guide his steps.

I would bewitch
the thorns that crowd
his path.

I would conjure
the smile
that melts my heart.

I try to learn one or two every year.
Plantain, mullein, chicory.
I try to learn some usefulness.
Some nice lady told me the other day
That she could never learn medicinal plants.
It seems she had never considered
Learning them one at a time.
I have to remember to learn the name
Of that **** that spits needles at me
When I get too close

I swear,
I was laying in bed this morning
minding my own business.
Letting the children get themselves
ready for school
and intent
on falling back asleep for a little while.
And in-between
the text messages
and the phone calls
came a hug
from someone I couldn't see.

I sent out a panicked message or two.
Tell me that you are okay
so I don't have to worry.

I swear,
it wouldn't be so bad
if the invisible
would just leave a calling card.

Waiting on the sour dough
To rise sufficiently
For kneading

The big grand dog
Is laying beside me on the couch
Snoring loud

The laundry
Is done
And put away

The breeze is cool
It will be a good night
For dreaming

Basket of resource books and herbs is in the car.
2. Basket of sewing tools and knitting needles is packed with an item or two to stitch.
3. One cast iron *** is ready to go. Two more in the process of burning off and seasoning.
4. Linen caps and kerchiefs are starched. Clothes are laid out.
5. Pack basket is full of pottery and utensils. Need to ask the woodworker if he will make me a lid and dasher for the butrer churn.
6. Copper kettle is filled with a bag of seasoned walnuts and two tin skilkets.
7. Still working on ingredients for the larder. Storing them in period appropriate containers is a puzzle.
8. Spinning wheel is excited for the new adventure. She said bring plenty of roving.

once
i sat alone at a civil war battlefield
in a picnic shelter
at dusk in the fading light.
i sang old songs
to amuse myself.
my voice is not golden
but there was no one
to annoy.
i noticed
at the far end of the shelter
the faded out shape
of a man
standing
and then another
and another.
there must have been
a dozen in the end.
i suppose
it had been
a goodly number of years
since the old soldiers
had heard a woman
singing.
i sang all the old songs
i knew.
the sound of a car
and headlights
diverted my attention
when i looked back
the company was gone

I've never liked
looking in the mirror.
Something about the reflection-
there-
never suited me.
That face couldn't be mine,
could it?
So today when
I felt your heart beating
in my chest
I wondered
at the strangeness of your particular rhythm
and how it beats so perfectly within me.
One day, maybe,
when time slants sideways
again
we will escape back into-
whatever it was-
we were before

love isn't always
hearts and roses

sometimes
it's an ashtray
perched precariously
between us

sometimes it's a
purple crocus
blooming
in January

sometimes it's just
the smile
I see
in your eyes

i stopped singing siren songs
some time ago
at least i wrote it in a poem
once

i stopped singing songs

the little bird stopped
singing in my ear

there were no words

you asked me not to make
a project out of you
and i nodded along

i am not so unbroken
that i could
fix
any thing

there are always
consequences

they've chewed on me
before

standing in line
at the funeral home
back where i grew up

waiting for someone
to pay respects
to the dearly departed

i heard the young
dead woman gloat
a little

pleased with the plethora
of flowers and throws
and angel figurines

and the long line of mourners

and the way
her ***** looked
in the shirt she wore

she thought
and i'm not paraphrasing much
that 'she looked pretty good
for a dead girl'

i used to think
that we left this world
and stepped into angel wings

but now i know
we cannot be
what we haven't been

I saw a question
in your eyes
the last time we walked.

I can’t remember
the sky
ever shining bluer.

I wonder, if, somewhere
under passion-colored leaves
you found an answer.

yesterday's class involved
serving the suicide caller
if you know me
you may suspect that I have met this issue
a time or two before
some days I looked it in the mirror

there was real struggle
on several faces around the room
everybody reneged on last night's plans
nobody felt like playing games
being social

I wandered off
sat at the lake
watched the water in the reservoir
placid and blue-green
and wandered back to sit
in my room

the pied piper of somewhere
wandered down the hall with a guitar
and we all followed
sang songs for a couple of hours
make a joyful noise
is sometimes the best therapy

and after the pied piper
and all the merry girls disappeared
back down the hall
two very real conversations
snuck up on me
out of the blue

it will take some time
to digest all the information
sometime after midnight
a text came to my phone
with the message
"be still, and know that I am God"

my job may be to rescue the perishing
but there is someone who will rescue me

Dozens of smelly pooping critters
None of which belong to me
Are on my last nerve tonight

I have walked for an hour
And a half
Chasing two houdini goats
And I am flat tuckered

Something has to give
The hogs are even
Starting to complain

In 2013 I lost a friend, soul brother and collaborator. He is the John in the titles that say written with John. Over the next few months another poet and I collected as much of his work as we could and put it in an anthology as a sort of living memorial.

https://www.createspace.com/4939401

I would be glad to email the pdf to anyone that is interested.

I knew a poet once.

He was the top of a tall mountain
of all the best words.

Fighting.

His words were a war
against social injustice
of all times.

His face was beautiful
with scars and lines
that remembered
every battle.

There was Issa, and a bowl of soup.
I remember the fly that buzzed
in the windshield
and tears behind sunglasses.

Why do poets set
like suns?

the slurs don't work anymore
I know i'm not a *****
and I don't care
whether or not you think
I am a good woman

I don't owe you
any more

you can threaten my life
if it makes you feel bigger
but you can't
take the power of my being

I find myself in odd moments
repeating a nursery rhyme
out of the blue
complete with the hand movements

Crazy, you say
for a 41 year old woman
to be singing about a rained on spider
without a small child
anywhere near?

I was starting to think so.

But then I realized
that it has been a season of
spirit drenching rain.

One catastrophe biting
at the tail of the next.

So my inner child came out to play.
Smile, she said.
the sky is blue, she said.
The rain brings new life, she said.



*. . . and the eensy weensy spider went up the spout again

I dreamed this morning of Alicia.
We met and she looked
Just like the last time I saw her alive
Sometime in 1991.

I looked the same too.
And we picked up
Right where we left off.

When I woke up
I realized
That I must have been dead.

There was no pain there.

Your truck isn't stolen.  
I got it stuck in the field.
Keys are in bowl.
We will unstick it tomorrow.  
I picked a quart of blackberries.
Had to walk back in the rain

P.s.
Tyson got a new toy.

You’re whispering secrets to stars
and I’m warbling love songs
to confused meadowlarks.

Tennyson is too romantic
for a fool like me.

Maybe I should keep to my tower--
busy fingers making seams
no one can see.

Even if there are curses.

I will still walk
through the green valley
holding a valiant hand.

the other morning I woke to a commotion
a bird got in the house
and the cat found it
gato got a few good licks in
Anna locked him in the living room
and we encouraged the bird
out the kitchen door

later that night
when I got home from the fort
I found a colleague of the black bird
door nail dead in the upstairs hallway
black claw feet sticking straight up

I hoped it was a different bird.
Not the one we saved.
But what method to my madness
that one bird was worth more
than the other?

Last night was such
a ridiculously busy night
In dispatch.

And we were vastly outnumbered
by the work
We needed to do.

That when the gas station clerk
called to say she found
a roach--

I said,
You don't mean an insect,
do you?

noise is a good deal on my mind
today.
I don't mean the sounds
that people make.
Just that rumbling, growling
scream
that comes up from the middle
of me.
I got so I didn't notice it
until it is a little absent.
This morning I found three slow
gray snails on a bush on the woods-trail.
And while I was weeding the mint
the wind started blowing
dandelion seeds toward me
and they grew wings and flew away.
Turns out they were termites.
Ordinary miracles-
until you figure in the absence of noise.

I am no Wendy;
but my voice brings you back to me.
And you sit around my feet,
anxious for a story
or a kiss.
Listening to my words
spinning adventures,
like so much golden thread;
spellbound by my gentle whisper.
You are welcome to stay,
through spring rain
and autumn crisping,
though you still search
for someone with soft hands
and bountiful breast.
And when my gracious gifts spill over
from my full-grown lap,
you scoop them up with wondrous hands
and all the hunger
of a Lost Boy

he comes out of the woodwork
every five to seven years
(maybe he's a locust)

usually when he's lonely
or *****
or wants to blow his brains out

he kicked the drug *****
out of his trailer
(he overheard
her cheating thoughts)
and so
she went back to his brother

it was a nice visit
he complimented me maybe,
he said i'm not man crazy anymore

I think maybe
he's made his last appearance
in my story

if he doesn't know me
in twenty two years
well, I don't have
the experience to compete
with his latest conquests

Three times so far
This week
I have felt
His thoughts run
Electric
Along my body.

I can't see
His face.

Can't say for certain
What direction
The thoughts travel
From

Just my luck
To feel
And be blind
All at the same time

a co-worker just confided that i am a better cook
than a colleague who considers herself an expert in the field.
much surprised, i didn't think in my year tenure
i had shared enough of my kitchen
to make an impression.
apparently it is the simple things,
that count in life.
i am reminded of the old lady
giving instructions to the young housewife,
to make good butter you must first have a
good brown or mouse-colored cow.
and never feed it turnips.
i won't go through the entire list of thou shalts.
but it must be true
when we shine heart on the fruits of our labors
they will in turn nourish and enrich
the hearts that love us.

my mother
always went to psychics
and palm readers
there were things
she wanted to know

lately
i've been looking
at the lines on my hand
and they
never seem to be
in the same place

i wonder
what a palm reader
might have to say
about that

i haven't seen
one of those neon signs
in years and years
i doubt that i could
in all good conscience
push aside the curtain
of curiosity
to ask the question

i am half tempted
to trace all the lines
in permanent black marker
to see
if i can see
how far they wander

He said that
I hadn't posted anything new
For twenty two days
And noticed
That maybe I better dip
My toes back in the pond
Of creativity

Maybe he should have
Specified
Something regarding quality
Of said creativity

:)

Every time I set foot
Out back
That old hawk
Starts hollering

And then I get to work
And there's
Another old hawk
Hollering at me there

Just once
I wish that old bird
Would spit it out
In plain English

I don't speak
Not one word
Of hawk

Not even
When I dream

the day my brother died
I had psychic visions
all day
of him coming to my work
and blowing his brains out
in front of me

I wasn't surprised
much by the phone call

Today I had another
vision
it was me
stabbing myself
in the stomach
with an English scalping knife

and I don't know
what it is supposed
to mean

Because I'm sitting
at McDonald's
with my daughter
on the free wifi

I can't be dead.

today i washed out the tall pack basket with the canvas straps
tomorrow i will start a game of hide and seek
throughout the house and barn
to fill it with all the detritus of running
an 18th century kitchen

1. the cast iron pots all have to be burnt and seasoned
2. locate my tomahawk, i will need that, the frontier is a brutal place
3. spoons and utensils and s-hooks
4. the wooden bowls and pottery mugs
5. the mint tea i collected from the garden last year and dried
6. staples, like corn meal and salt, all in period appropriate containers
7. receipt books, because recipes were unheard of
8. the seeds i saved, can't remember what they came from, just from the area out of the garden where i collected them -- guess that will be a surprise for later
9. vessels for collecting water
10. spinning wheel and wool roving, though it won't fit in the basket

I guess that's a start. Maybe now I won't dream that I come to the fort completely unprepared for the first day of the season.

An almost-stranger
called me to the hospital
And I rode with my family
Nearer-knowing the reality
than I thought.
I walked through old familiar halls,
Remembering a bout with pneumonia and
Family brushes with car wrecks and cancer.
And then I found my mother--
Weeping,
Tissue box in hand.
“He’s gone,” she said.
And I looked around for my children
And wondered how they would be
Affected by the news.
We sat
And waited
for God only knows what.
And the coroner came and took us in a room
To see him,
that grey, husk of a man.
How could they say that he--
that cold man
Is my father?
I shed a tear or two
And made decisions
Right and wrong
Dreading the day when I would grieve.
Days and weeks passed,
Years came and went,
And I,
Was left to wonder
How you can miss someone
You never had . . .

Time to pick up
all the shattered pieces.

Cement the colored
fragments of memory
and voice

with hope
and something new
that resembles

confidence.

A new day shines--

I will emerge
brilliant
as the sun.

it occurred to me this morning
as i was building a fire in the four-legged cast iron stove
that my technique wouldn't win me any prizes from boy scouts

i would have to say
that the way i get around to warmth and light
is similar to the way
i do just about anything else

a little of this
            and a little of that

bits of paper
strewn on the floor

a handful of broom sweepings

dryer lint

a fervent wish for leftover coals from the night before

a charcoal briquette or two

kindling

the dance that happens cause i forgot to open the damper

peaceful meditation

smoke in the living room

another lit match

     and finally a flame and a crackle

I have all these questions to ask her
but she flies away from the fence-line
and over the barns

I hear her calling in the early morning hours
but I get no answers
not to the questions my heart makes

and I feel the hot heavy breath
of the hunters
their foot treads sound ominous
on the forest floor

I have been caught too many times before
I have been folded up in heavy hands
until I couldn't even breathe
and I am reluctant to be lost again

I need that Muse-woman
to come back here
and tell me if I am really ready
to fly.

i brought the potted plant into the kitchen
nobody remembered to water him
this week
and he was looking downtrodden
and wilty.

all that talk about
microwaved hotdogs
and pork chops cooked
a half dozen different ways
has made me slightly hungry

i have some granola bars
in my locker and
two and one half hours
until shift ends

looking forward to
seeing the inside of
these eyelids
insomnia has been crushing
all my best dreams lately

here's hoping
you have better
luck

Leftover yarn
wanted to be something
and so I began
to crochet stitches and rows
until it started
to resemble a scarf.
I thought of you
as my hands worked
how you would
appreciate the soft angora thread
how the length
of it would keep you warm
on cold days
when you might be missing me
it is yours, if you want it

I never was much
for rambling on and on about a thing
but if you could see my thoughts
well, then, I guess
you'd know

it sounds like an old joke

i've lost over a thousand pouds
over the years

what, you say?

how can that be?

when a soul is born
to learn the biggest lesson
well, sometimes,
you have to go through some stuff

sometimes, you have to starve
to appreciate the end of famine

and so i am learning
to say goodbye
to those who can't
or won't
love me

maybe i will still be
a blessing to those folks
somehow

but right now
i've got to roll up my sleeves
and learn that biggest lesson.

I wonder if I have invited the storm--
     Provoked passion--
Traces of sweat in swelling heat
      glisten
and I taunt dark clouds singing siren songs.
      The curves of my voice
thrill lonely spaces.

Flashes of light crease the sky --
      similar bursts echo
from your eyes.

Reaching around I tremble
as the heavens
      rumble loudly back.

I will meet you there
     inside the tempest.

Let it rain.