Favorite Wendell Berry Poems...

Of late, I have been doing far more reading than writing. Although I confess, that I've written more than I've shared and perhaps you will read it soon. But until then, I thought I'd share a few of Wendell Berry's poems that have moved me lately...

Drouth

All day the crops burn in cloudless air,
Drouth lengthening against belief. At night
The husbands and the wives lie side by side,
Awake, the ache of panic in their bones,
Their purposes betrayed by purposes
Unknown, whose mystery is the dark in which
They wait and grieve. All may be lost, and then
What will they do? When money is required
Of them, and they have none, where will they go?

Many will go in blame against the world,
Hating it for their pain, and they will go
Alone across the dry, bright, lifeless days,
And thus alone into the dark. Others
In grief and loss will see more certainly
What they have loved, and will belong to it
And to each other as in happiness
They never did-- hearing, though the whole world
Go dry, the hidden raincrow of their hope.


For an Absence

When I cannot be with you
I will send my love (so much
is allowed to human lovers)
to watch over you in the dark--
a winged small presence
who never sleeps, however long
the night. Perhaps it cannot
protect or help, I do not know,
but it watches always, and so
you will sleep within my love
within the room within the dark.
And when, restless, you wake
and see the room palely lit
by that watching, you will think,
"It is only dawn," and go
quiet to sleep again.


The Blue Robe

(note: This is how I (Will) would one day like to to look upon my beloved)

How joyful to be together, alone
as when we first were joined
in our little house by the river
long ago, except that now we know

each other, as we did not then;
and now instead of two stories fumbling
to meet, we belong to one story
that the two, joining, made. And now

we touch each other with the tenderness
of mortals, who know themselves:
how joyful to feel the heart quake

at the sight of a grandmother,
old friend in the morning light,
beautiful in her blue robe!


That's all for now. I hope these move you to read Wendell Berry in any context. I cannot promise that he will move you, but he has moved me, and helped my soul understand how to heal.

Possibly my new favorite poem...

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream---and not make dreams your master;
If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And---which is more---you'll be a Man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling

An inspiring message...

I just listened to this message from flatirons church. Well... those are all the messages but I listened to the one from Dec. 13-14 entitled "Move On." I was incredibly moved to hope, and had to put it out there for your encouragement.

I work for these people and I don't really know what to say...

So weird...

Can I See Another's Woe?

Can I see another's woe,
And not be in sorrow too?
Can I see another's grief,
And not seek for kind relief?

Can I see a falling tear,
And not feel my sorrow's share?
Can a father see his child
Weep, nor be with sorrow filled?

Can a mother sit and hear
An infant groan, an infant fear?
No, no!  never can it be!
Never, never can it be!

And can He who smiles on all
Hear the wren with sorrows small,
Hear the small bird's grief and care,
Hear the woes that infants bear --

And not sit beside the next,
Pouring pity in their breast,
And not sit the cradle near,
Weeping tear on infant's tear?

And not sit both night and day,
Wiping all our tears away?
Oh no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!

He doth give his joy to all:
He becomes an infant small,
He becomes a man of woe,
He doth feel the sorrow too.

Think not thou canst sigh a sigh,
And thy Maker is not by:
Think not thou canst weep a tear,
And thy Maker is not year.

Oh He gives to us his joy,
That our grief He may destroy:
Till our grief is fled and gone
He doth sit by us and moan.

-William Blake

And death shall have no dominion...

And death shall have no dominion.

Dead men naked they shall be one

With the man in the wind and the west moon;

When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,

They shall have stars at elbow and foot;

Though they go mad they shall be sane,

Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;

Though lovers be lost love shall not;

And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.

Under the windings of the sea

They lying long shall not die windily;

Twisting on racks when sinews give way,

Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;

Faith in their hands shall snap in two,

And the unicorn evils run them through;

Split all ends up they shan't crack;

And death shall have no dominion.

And death shall have no dominion.

No more may gulls cry at their ears

Or waves break loud on the seashores;

Where blew a flower may a flower no more

Lift its head to the blows of the rain;

Though they be mad and dead as nails,

Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;

Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,

And death shall have no dominion.

-Dylan Thomas (1933)

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_death_shall_have_no_dominion"

Invictus

Anti-Meridian finally appeared in my mailbox... best lyric triumphantly sung by Reese Roper:

Hope Unstoppable,
sing the morning sun,
wake up, oh sleeper,
the Daylight has come.

mmmm.... good stuff.

I love this...

This is probably the funniest thing I've seen this week.

Anti-Meridian

Brave Saint Saturn's new album comes out today. Their last one, The Light of Things Hoped For is one of my favorite albums of all time. I really like what I hear of the new album, check it out at bravesaintsaturn.com