When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Unless there is a still center
in the middle of the storm ...
Unless a person amidst of all their activities
preserves a secret room in their heart
where they stand alone before God ...
Unless we do this,
we will lose all sense of spiritual direction
and be torn to pieces.