The Second Coming of the Trees – A Poem by Wendell Berry
Part 12 of ‘Window Poems’
by Wendell Berry
The country where he lives
is haunted
by a ghost of an old forest.
In the cleared fields
where he gardens
and pastures horses
it stood once,
and will return. There wil be
a resurrection of the wild.
Already it stands in wait
at the pasture fenced.
It is rising up
in the waste placed of the cities.
When the fools of the capitals
have devoured each other
in righteousness,
and the machines have eaten
the rest of us, then
there will be the second coming
of the trees. They will come
straggling over the fences
slowly, but soon enough.
The highway will sound
with the feet of the wild herds,
returning. Beaver will ascend
the stream as the trees
close over them.
The wold and the panther
will find their old ways
through the nights. Water
and air will flow clear.
Certain calamities
will have passed,
and certain pleasures.
The wind will do without
corners. How difficult
to think of it: miles and miles
and no window.
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