Never Whole

It was sometime in 1997 that I started reading Wendell Berry. Kenneth introduced me to him, and we would speed walk/race to the 'B' section at Moe's Bookstore in Berkeley to get first chance at the current selection of used books. Berry had an enormous influence on me and his ideas were a big part of a series of decisions to move back to my roots in Missouri and eventually to a farm. Our goal was quite explicit. We were joining friends there to live and work side by side in community. That experiment didn't go as planned (of course), but it was wonderful to me.

Still, we moved to town after only about a year. Then we moved a few miles farther away. Then we moved to Cambodia. Back in Missouri for over a year now, I've been reflecting on how the question of community has followed me everywhere I go.

Which is why I started with Berry.

I haven't read much by Berry in a long time, but I remember him: fragments of poems, the arrangement of words on a page, his ideas debated and adapted in my mind. Other people and ideas influenced me, but it was Berry's voice that articulated what was closest to my own heart and mind. His poem about marriage became a lens through which I viewed the unfolding of community inside and around me:

"It is to be broken. It is to be
torn open. It is not to be
reached and come to rest in
ever. I turn 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."
(HERE at Google Books)

Looking back, I see how my quest for community led directly to my growing involvement in the conflict transformation and restorative justice movements. And all along the way, Berry's words have followed me like a shadow:

"It is healing. It is never whole."

May everyone be released from all suffering!