Openings: Poems

by Wendell Berry

The author's love of nature emerges in thirty-six poems decrying the rape of our environment and America's obsession with military power

Genres: Poetry, Nature

67 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1968

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

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Openings (1968), Wendell Berry’s second major volume of verse, revealsa poet—and a man—approaching the fullness of what he would soon become.

Four years before, in 1965, Berry—a native of Port Royal, Kentucky—abandoned the literary rat race in NYC and, having purchased land near Port Royal, began to divide his time between farming his land, writing, and teaching at the University of Kentucky, an hour and a half’s drive away. In time he would devote himself exclusively to farming and writing, but this book is the product of that transition period. He is not only buoyed by the beauties of this new place (the sequence, “Window Poems,” which displays the marvels of the Kentucky River country which can be seen from the poet’s desk), but also burdened by his new place’s old history (the powerful ode “To My Grandfather’s Slaves.”)

These poems take on a particular intensity from the newness of these pleasures and conflicts, but I still think Berry's later poems are even better. They too are filled with joy and rage, but also rooted in a persona more grounded, more rooted in the self and the soil.

This is, however, a volume well worth reading. The meditations on nature are apt and appropriate, and the poems on history and politics, although sometimes fiery. (as in those about war in Vietnam) are always filled with compassion and rooted in a love for the land.

Here are a couple of my favorites from Openings. The first is about the beauty of a kingfisher at dusk the second about the horrors of strip mining.

BEFORE DARK

From the porch at dusk I watched
a kingfisher wild in flight
he could only have made for joy.

He came down the river, splashing
against the water's dimming face
like a skipped rock, passing

on down out of sight. And still
I could hear the splashes
farther and farther away

as it grew darker. He came back
the same way, dusky as his shadow,
sudden beyond the willows.

The splashes went on out of hearing.
It was dark then. Somewhere
the night had accommodated him

—at the place he was headed for
or where, led by his delight,
he came.


EAST KENTUCKY, 1967

What vision or blindness lives
here among the broken places
in the small of burning
and the stench of dead streams
where only machines thrive
on the death of all else?
What vision or blindness
can live in the sight of children
who inherit the eyes of broken men,
and in the sight of farms torn open
where the rich lock like toads
to the backs of the helpless?

[El · Rating 4 out of 5]

some of them were kind of boring ngl

[Bryan Neuschwander · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not really a flowers
and trees poetry

appreciator--I'd rather
just gaze out the

window by myself, but
wax philosophical

with windows and war
and "the earth / is

poisoned with narrow lives"
and you'll have me listening,

invaded by the "we" of "Dark with Power"
and "The Want of Peace."

[Sanjuro · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the great Ingmar Bergman film "Winter Light," one of the characters obsesses over the potential of atomic annihilation. In the Paul Schrader film "First Reformed," influenced by Bergman, a similar character is obsessed with the potential of a catastrophic climate disaster. In this collection of poems, published in 1968, Berry is concerned with both of these things, and more. He writes a little of war, and a lot of the way that humans are wreaking havoc on the natural world, and about a general anxiety and unease about other disasters besides. He worries about his children and their future and the future of the planet. He wonders if the planet wouldn't be better off without humans at all, but then he remembers the ones he loves and he feels the tension.

Actually, I was ambivalent about the first half of the book. I enjoyed it, but it lacked the thematic focus of Berry's first collection. However, when the Window Poems began about half way through (this was the second time I'd read these particular poems), the collection takes shape and the themes converge and the thematic intensity takes form, and the collection takes on a new level of beauty and import. In particular, Window Poems 10-15 were stirring and the imagery and tension was palpable. The poem "To a Siberian Woodsman" also really stirred me, it reminded me of some recent Szymborska poems I'd read, where the natural world knows no borders and does not respect the broken structures of humanity; this poem by Berry sees the Russian woodsman not as "communist foe" but rather as kindred spirit, which demonstrates the extreme brokenness of our nationalism.

Although the first half of the collection was hit or miss, the second half was wonderful reading, pulling me into another place entirely.

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this collection. "Marriage to Tanya" was the essence of my marriage vows. Some might say, "What a downer," but I already knew the marriage we had started to create. Even the, it wasn't about sweetness and light. Here's the part of the poem I used:

"Marriage"
to Tanya"

You come near me
with the nearness of sleep.
And yet, I am not quiet.
It is o be broken. It is to be torn open. It is not to be
reached and come to rest in
ever. Iturn against you,
I break from you. I turn to you.
We hurt, and are hurt,
and have each other for healing.
It is healing. It is never whole.

[Lauren Winter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Window Poems and The Peace of Wild Things - favorites. It's interesting to read Berry's earlier poetry after reading his later sabbath poems, I feel like I'm on a journey backwards in time with him. I admire his lifelong pursuit of stillness.

[Old Time Tales · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wendell Berry's poetry is a treasure. Full of hope, caring and thoughtful words. He should be promoted and taught and discussed in all schools, not just his native Kentucky. He needs to be shared and enjoyed.

[Autumn · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite volume of Berry so far.

[Christmas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Though I love many of Berry’s essays, I found the poems in this collection to be awkward and a slog to read.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fruitful poems by an agrarian farmer in Kentucky. Check the timing.

[Maughn Gregory · Rating 5 out of 5]

Astoundingly insightful, heart-opening and politically engaging in just the right way.

[Jordan Kinsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Draws my heart homeward.