the sorrel filly

The songs of small birds fade away

into the bushes after sundown,

the air dry, sweet with goldenrod.

Beside the path, suddenly, bright asters

flare in the dusk.  The aged voices

of a few crickets thread the silence.

It is a quiet I love, though my life

too often drives me through it deaf,

Busy with cost and losses, I waste

the time I have to be here - a time

blessed beyond my deserts, as I know,

if only I would keep aware.  The leaves

rest in the air, perfectly still,

I would like them to rest in my mind

as still, as simply spaced.  As I approach,

the sorrel filly looks up from her grazing,

poised there, light on the slope

as a young apple tree.  A week ago

I took her away to sell, and failed

to get my price, and brought her home 

again.  Now in the quiet I stand

and look at her a long time, glad

to have recovered what is lost

in the exchange of something for money.

~ Wendell Berry

from Farming Poems

photo from hopes creek ranch