Let me wake in the night
and hear it raining
and go back to sleep.
– Wendell Berry (“Prayers and Sayings of the Mad Farmer”)
Upon the roof and off the eave:
cascades to soothe a dream
when no urgency awaits,
when earthly strategies step aside
and praise what man cannot create—
let me sleep so soundly!
Let me trust the land endures
man’s ambitions to claim
a holiday for its creatures,
as earth and sky make love
a priority of life. O’ musty
scent of after-rain, let me
wake to freely sail among
white cumulus in the grand
regatta of blue sky seas.
