The Peace of Wild Things - Wendell Berry

"I rest in the grace of the world, and am free."

Over the past year I have said to myself, “Katie, you love poetry, why not let yourself gather it up and enjoy it on the daily.” So, I started buying poetry books and I have not stopped.

Wendell Berry is a poet and writer that came up regularly over the years in my work and interest around the local food movement. I don’t know how I didn’t read more of his work until recently, but I’m so glad I am here now.

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The Peace of Wild Things
by Wendell Berry from The Peace of Wild Things And Other Poems

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.