Laura and Leslie's arrival, with the pursuit of an environmental degree, reminded me of my work with the Kentucky Institute of Education and Sustainable Development. I always forget about the green work of that degree, and today I was thinking about how much I enjoyed discovering writers of the Earth, including Wendell Berry of Kentucky. I used to teach the idea that when I thought man would ruin the earth, I'd look to the sidewalk of my home and see how the grasses and weeds I removed yesterday, would grow back to overtake the cracks. Given a few years with no attention, the earth would swallow the concrete completely. Maude is more powerful than our humanity can ever be. I find contentment with this.
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of 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 for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Wendell Berry
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