Another Day: Sabbath Poems, 2013-2023

by Wendell Berry

A new collection of poems and the companion volume to the popular bestseller This Day , Wendell Berry's Another Day is another stunning contribution to the poetry canon from one of America's most beloved writers A companion to his beloved volume This Day and Wendell Berry's first new poetry collection since 2016, this new selection of Sabbath Poems are filled with spiritual longing and political extremity, memorials and celebrations, elegies and lyrics, alongside the occasional rants of the Mad Farmer, pushed to the edge yet again by his compatriots and elected officials. With the publication of this new edition, it has become increasingly clear that the Sabbath Poems have become the very heart of Berry's work.

Genres: Poetry

224 pages, Hardcover

Published August 6, 2024

About the author

Wendell Berry is a conservationist, farmer, essayist, novelist, professor of English and poet. He was born August 5, 1934 in Henry County, Kentucky where he now lives on a farm. The New York Times has called Berry the "prophet of rural America."

Reviews

[Kelley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Berry’s poetry holds all the stark, lovely language of his novels. His sense of humor is here, his outrage and his wisdom. I loved it. I love him.

(The rare misses for me were usually the multi-page poems. Is this odd? That I love him in bite-sized servings and in the feast of a full book, but I turn my nose up at a portion spread over a handful of pages?)

The collection, subtitled Sabbath Poems, is from 2013 to 2023. A year might include 20 or more selections, or just a handful. They pulse with his love of nature, of people, of God.

“The world lives by its beauty in excess of need," he writes.

Aging is a frequent topic, not surprising for a man in his eighth decade. “It is no privilege to become the one living authority on your life.”

He is adamant without being strident about the recklessness with which people squander of the gifts of the earth.

“To ask for more than is given,
to take more than is given back,
is to have less, and finally
nothing.”

One poem references the “superfluous beauty” of birds.

“These so visible must stand for countless ones
and kinds easily overlooked or hard to see
or invisible. A world of words could not
describe this wordless world.”

I offer a few favorites in their entirety to draw you in. And I offer my absolution if you decide to skip one here or there. Just don’t skip the book.

XVIII (2013)
Young love grows older,
grows old, accumulates
burdens, losses, failures,
griefs, but also the history
of itself lasting through time,
and so transcending time
as an image of forever
ever keeping, never old.

IV (2016)
When I speak to you of love
I do not speak as I am
but as I am in love with you
which is better than I am.

XII (2016)
Sleep undefended in the dark
entrusted to the light that so far
has waked you to the morning
that (whatever the news) is singing.

[Jake B-Y · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the third poem of the book, Berry writes:

“To one whose eyes have opened, any place
is compounded of places ending
to the end of time, and travel is well
accomplished by standing still.”

And in the next:

“The years
brought him love and grief.
They have taught him that grief
is love clarified.”

These are the threads woven through Berry’s second collection of Sabbath poems: to travel by standing still, and to come face to face with grief as love clarified. Grief for Berry is of course about the environment, but it is also about an old man looking to the end of his life and remembering those who are already gone.

There are other poems, of course; nearly every year he includes poems that he wrote for his wife on her birthday and on their anniversary. Some poems are simply four or five lines that capture a specific moment, from a thunderstorm in the dead of night to a poem about a phoebe. But the beating heart of this collection is the beauty and grief of love.

Some of the poems didn’t work for me. I found that I detest citations and quotations in poetry. But more often than not, the two or three poems I read before bed led me to a greater appreciation of the place where I live and who (human and nonhuman) I share that life with.

I’ll close the review with lines from the penultimate poem:

“Your dream of the ruin of your home land
now brings alive in you your small
share of the greater love that made
the heaven and the earth. Highest
and whole, that love is the Sabbath morning
where you at last may come to rest.”

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

“It puzzled me once,
that ancient call
to ceaseless prayer.
Now I know.
Help me. Help me.
If I must stay
longer at work
give me strength.”

[Laura Kisthardt · Rating 4 out of 5]

2025 accidentally became the year of Wendell Berry. I read this collection of poetry off and on for 8 months of the year. Originally I started it on sabbatical… seemed fitting to read Sabbath poems during that time. However, only a few poems directly address sabbath as a topic. This was my first deep dive into Wendell Berry’s writing. Reading such a big collection of poems gave an introduction to his focus areas and themes from the years 2013-2023. I enjoyed the book overall and I will probably read his earlier collection of sabbath poems at some point. At the time I picked up this collection, I didn’t know there was an earlier one on the same topic/theme.

[Ted Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

An act of kindness is not
an advance, not progress,
but a triumph. The unfound
organ we call “the heart”
has survived another day.

St. Wendell strikes again!

[Danny Balister · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wendell Berry is my number one. Maybe some days Mary Oliver, but really Wendell Berry is my top word maker there ever was. One of the most important in the history of American literature. That's how deeply is words have influenced me over the years. "Another Day" is a continuation of "This Day" which is a collection of Sabbath poems Berry put together from 1979-2013. "Another Day" picks up in 2013 and runs through 2023. While this new collection of Sabbath poems still primarily centers on spiritual longing, natural wonder, and celebration in an almost lyrically woven sense, as the world becomes more perplexing, it seems to rely more heavily on tributes, memorials, elegies, and even rants from the mad farmer to try to make sense of it all. While something about this collection doesn't seem quite as tight as it's predecessor; to be fair to Berry, he is over sixty years my senior at this point so I have a feeling I'll be coming back to this long into the twilight of my life.

Favorites included:
2013- I, II, III, VI, X
2014- II, VIII
2016- VIII, IX
2018- II, IX
2019- XII, XVI, XVII
2020- III, VI
2022- I, II
2023-I

[Ginny · Rating 5 out of 5]

I took a very long time to read this slowly, reading many of the poems over and over again until I felt certain I had fully appreciated their meaning. This is a collection of beautiful poems. I love Wendell Berry.

[Ben Weis · Rating 4 out of 5]

2017 had the best poems

[Danielle Hardy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wendell Berry remains one of my most favorite authors. I cherish his words. This of his poem books may just be my favorite.

[Daniel Oster · Rating 4 out of 5]

simply stunning

[Molly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wendell Berry’s musings on nature, eternity, love, life, and loss never fail to evoke deep emotion or inspire deep admiration. I simply love his writing.

[Chris]

5/19/25— from a rabbit room review. Sounds really good. I need to check out his other writings as well.

[Timothy Hoiland · Rating 5 out of 5]

The hidden bird is singing
“All right. Yes. Yes yes. All right.”

Nothing worth saying
ever is finally said.

[Brian Dukes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gentle and thoughtful, I felt like it was a positive use for my attention, to ponder the beauty of nature, alongside man's destructive tendencies.

[Anna Adami]

Wendell Berry’s poems are simultaneously odes to place, friends, and virtue and elegies to the same. Edifying and grounding, his work elevates the beauty of marriage, bird song, and noble work.

[Sharon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing!