A Homecoming by Wendell Berry

One faith is bondage. Two
are free. In the trust
of old love, cultivation shows
a dark graceful wilderness
at its heart. Wild
in that wilderness, we roam
the distances of our faith,
safe beyond the bounds
of what we know. O love,
open. Show me
my country. Take me home.

Planting Trees by Wendell Berry

In the mating of trees,
the pollen grain entering invisible
the doomed room of the winds, survives
the ghost of the old forest
that stood here when we came. The ground
invites it, and it will not be gone.
I become the familiar of that ghost
and its ally, carrying in a bucket
twenty trees smaller than weeds,
and I plant them along the way
of the departure of the ancient host.
I return to the ground its original music.
It will rise out of the horizon
of the grass, and over the heads
of the weeds, and it will rise over
the horizon of men’s heads. As I age
in the world it will rise and spread,
and be for this place horizon
and orison, the voice of its wİnds.
I have made myself a dream to dream
of its rising, that has gentled my nights.
Let me desire and wish well the life
these trees may live when I
no longer rise in the mornings
to be pleased by the green of them
shining, and their shadows on the ground,
and the sound of the wind in them.

A Poem of Thanks by Wendell Berry

I have been spared another day
to come into this night
as though there is a mercy in things
mindful of me. Love, cast all
thought aside. I cast aside
all thought. Our bodies enter
their brief precedence,
surrounded by their sleep.
Through you I rise, and you
through me, into the joy
we make, but may not keep.

The Third Dimension by Denise Levertov

Who’d believe me if
I said, “They took and

split me open from
scalp to crotch, and

still I’m alive, and
walk around pleased with

the sun and all
the world’s bounty.” Honesty

isn’t so simple:
a simple honesty is

nothing but a lie.
Don’t the trees

hide the wind between
their leaves and

speak in whispers?
The third dimension

hides itself.
If the roadmen

crack stones, the
stones are stones;

but love
cracked me open

and I’m
alive

to tell the tale–but not
honestly:

the words
change it. Let it be–

here in the sweet sun
–a fiction, while I

breathe and
change pace.

The Five Feet by Ed Sanders

You can always fight the foulest grief
with drinks and thrills
You can channelize your septum
with thousand dollar bills

But you better get obsessed again
on the Change Wheel’s rungs
or they’ll let the tumors grow
in the hummingbird’s lungs

You’ve got to have five feet
to skitter down the road

One foot in the grave
One foot in the glitter
One foot in the gutter
One foot in the glory
One foot near the Grail

Lawrence said to build a Boat of Death
upon that main
Well, you’d better patch the leaky Boat of Life
call it Paradise Plain

There’s nothing wrong with writing lines of verse
on a foam-flecked oar
Even if we cannot join Matisse
through Plato’s door

You’ve got to have five feet
to skitter down the road

One foot in the grave
One foot in the glitter
One foot in the gutter
One foot in the glory
One foot near the Grail

Climbing by Tom Clark

My heart in pieces like the bits
Of trains lost in the blue
Rain confused I roar off into
To learn how to build a ladder
With air in my lungs again
To be with you in that region
Of speed and altitude where our bodies
Sail off to be kissed and changed
By light that behaves like a hand
Picking us up in one state and putting
Us down in a different one every time