Where the Wild Things Are

Coming to the end of term, once again, seems to have been a wild ride through mayhem. ‘Busyness’ on all sides, last minute demands, rescheduling, previous requests resurfacing desperate to be finalized, clashes of needs, surprising interactions …little time to breathe…

And then you look at the cat

Or your dog

Or some birds outside the window

For whom absolutely none of the mayhem means a thing…and the heart rate settles, proportion and objectivity return…and as always

the poet has an answer:

The Peace of Wild Things

by Wendell Berry

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.  

Happy Holidays everyone:

All you parents who have to negotiate your children’s timetables, desires and moods while maintaining your own,

All you students who seek your own plans, wish lists and avoidance of others’ demands and

All you teachers who need to drink from the well of respite, catch up and renewal.

For those times you may feel you are floundering on a wild ride,

I hope you can regain some balance in remembering the peace of wild things.