p

Window Poems  (#19)

 

Peace.  May he waken

not too late from his wraths

to find his window still

clear in its wall, and the world

there.  Within things

there is peace, and at the end

of things.  It is the mind

turned away from the world

that turns against it.

The armed presidents stand

on deadly islands in the air,

overshadowing the crops.

Peace.  Let men, who cannot be brothers

to themselves, be brothers

to mulleins and daisies

that have learned to live on the earth.

Let them understand the pride

of sycamores and thrushes

that receive the light gladly, and do not

think to illuminate themselves.

Let them know that the foxes and the owls

are joyous in their lives,

and their gayety is praise to the heavens,

and they do not raven with their minds.

In the night the devourer,

and in the morning all things

find the light a comfort.

Peace. The earth turns

against all living, in the end.

And when mind has not outraged

itself against its nature,   

they die and become the place

they lived in.  Peace to the bones

that walk in the sun toward death,

for they will come to it soon enough.

Let the phoebes return in the spring

and build their nests of moss

in the porch rafters,

and in autumn let them depart.

Let the garden be planted,

and let the frost come.

Peace to the porch and the garden.

Peace to the man in the window.

 

            Wendell Berry