'Given'

This collection of poetry, by Wendell Berry, earned its keep on the first, cursory, birthday morning reading, with these lines, from How To Be A Poet.


Accept what comes from silence.
Make the best you can of it.
Of the little words that come
out of the silence, like prayers
prayed back to the one who prays,
make a poem that does not disturb
the silence from which it came.

Sometimes Berry's plain- spoken style can be banal. Sometimes it is clear like water, a gift to the thirsty.