A Poem for Some Peace of Mind
Wendell Berry’s “The Peace of Wild Things” is for all of us.
Last month, I spent an hour a day teaching an online reading comprehension class to some incoming seniors. I had to create the entire curriculum, which proved especially tricky. I included this poem, “The Peace of Wild Things,” by Wendell Berry, because… well… because of several reasons, but mainly because it speaks so directly to our entire world today. I think it will speak to you too.
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.
Have you felt it? That late-night, unable-to-sleep-because-my-mind-won’t-stop desperation? That’s what Berry describes in the first few lines.
An elder at my church a year ago confronted what I’ve often thought. He and his wife recently had a baby. He acknowleded that given the state of our world, that seems like a pretty crazy thing to do, because everything’s going to crap. It’s espeically clear since COVID’s readed its ugly head our way. I imagine many a parent struggles not to “fear what their life and their children’s lives may be.”
But when the poet awakes in sweat, he admits defeat to his anxiety, plants his feet on the floor and into his slippers, and then wanders outside, which for him means farmland. He “go[es] and lie[s] down where the wood drake (read: duck) rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.”
I imagine cool, wild grass. Sitting close to where it meets the water. Embraced by the cold crisp of midnight air. The sparkly song of crickets and frogs. Zillions of stars and a full moon above. Stillness. A pond with slow, smooth ripples from the subtle movement of a relaxing duck. A beautiful, white, long-legged heron wading.
This is “the peace of wild things.” The duck and the heron, they do not “tax their lives with forethought of grief.”
When my students study this poem, that’s the line they get lost on. It is also the center of the poem, so I make sure they labor to understand it. We talk about taxes, and they learn that taxes are taxing. Taxes “make heavy demands on” on taxpayers.
Then we talk about “forethought.” They remember that golfers yell “Fore!” before they swing at the ball. We talk about the word “before,” “foreshadow,” and some rebel in the back will mention “foreplay.” They get it: fore means “before.” So “forethought of grief” means thinking about grief before anything even happens. It’s the “what ifs.” it’s worst case scenarios; it’s a glass that is horribly half-empty. The class brainstorms examples of how we humans “tax our lives with forethought of grief.”
Animals don’t grieve what hasn’t happened. Mom and dad birds don’t obsess over their hatchlings: OMG what if Ted can’t fly as fast as his siblings? I know my mate won’t find me attractive after I lay these eggs and he’ll leave me and I’ll die alone and my kids will blame me because I didn’t lose that .04 ounce and if I did their dad would have stuck around.
The wild things live in the moment. The mother heron doesn’t fret over “what if” her baby bird develops a bum wing. Animals just are. They will respond and deal with troubles as they come. They don’t worry. My dog is 11 and she will so sadly die within a few years. I don’t think she stays up thinking about it. She enjoys life moment by moment.
The poem closes with this:
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.
I encourage you to do the same. To step outside when you can and simply observe. Pay attention to the bird on the branch: allow yourself to wonder what he’s thinking. Get lost in his tiny complexity — how God orchaestrated all the parts of him to work together, how he instinctually knows to build a nest and collects his treasured materials.
Wonder at our Creator, and remember how much detail gets lost on us. I like to think about the ocean in the middle of nowhere. I imagine the cliffs of some remote piece of island that no human sees or treads upon. All the mysterious creatures in the sea — all the drama and beauty and exotic mystery happening there, and no one even knows. Moments are occurring that will never be witnessed by human eyes. We are small, and we are loved by a huge God whose creative display can never be fully appreciated, and yet it exists, as an expression of His infinte beauty and wisdom, if nothing else.
Notice the peace, the lack of violence, the stillness. Soak in the moment. Make mental note of what you see — the colors, the textures, the movements. The sensation your skin is is reporting to your mind. The smell. The sounds. Look around and tell yourself the truth that everything around you is okay.
Wild things exude a contageous peace, something we domesticated humans pine for. So try some nature. Getting outside of ourselves does us all some good. ❤
Btw, if you happen to be reading this and know me in the real world, you can tell I wrote this a while back, since our beloved dog Ace passed last year. I didn’t have time to write a new thing today, and the daily post challenge goes on. Peace, friends.
