Outside Reading, A Timbered Choir - Melissa Marazzi

I have been reading on and off a book of poetry by Wendell Berry called a Timbered Choir. Berry is a lover of nature and that certainly comes out in his poetry – aside from the fact that he is also a farmer. His poems reflect much on nature around him and his reactions to them. A was reading one of his poems from 1981 in the book simply labeled IX. In this poem he sings his praises to a forest that he finds such beauty in. The interesting thing is though is that he mentions it is beautiful because man has neglected it, man has disregarded in and left it be. Berry describes how man’s progress seems only to stifle, not only ourselves, but the world around us. In our desire for development, we seem to be poisoning things on the way, Berry writes. I think this is unique perspective and I have to agree with Berry when he says that we must see the forest as “fellow presences,” our neighbor in this Earth, not “raw sources.” We must learn to appreciate the nature around us and not simply use it to further our development when it is not so necessary. Berry also refers to the forest as “blessed.” I think it is important for us to be able to appreciate the blessedness of the nature around us and not pervert God’s gifts for the sake development, and using it to make paper for a book about why He does not exist. It is “here with us” as Bery writes and we should enjoy it as such.