The Peace of the 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."

I wish I could say this was true of me, but instead, when I wake in the night at the least sound I try not to curse and take my anger out on Lance, 

cause he is a very convenient scapegoat. 

I have called these "the dark days".

It is kind of embarrassing to me just how dark these days can seem, when my struggle is against the swaddled child who magically maneuvers his arm out every time I get him in there snug and against the child who wants to do things "all by myself".

I am not lacking food or dealing with sickness, 

for which I can't truly imagine how difficult that would be. 

Yet these days are often full of struggle for me. And all I can think to do is to try to muster a sense of gratitude and ask forgiveness for taking so much for granted... 

meanwhile longing for the future, when children can feed and go to the bathroom all by themselves.