To Come Awake, And Stay Awake

Dear Friends,

It is the month of W.S. Merwinʻs birthday. This September 30th would have been his ninety-eighth, and it’s the fifth we have marked since becoming the stewards of the palm garden and William and Paula’s home. Each year around this time, I hear from many who wonder what William would have written, thought, done, about these baffling times. Here in the lush garden where William spent the last four decades of his life, and where his concerns “merge inevitably with work done every day, within sight of the house…and remain intimate and familiar rather than far away,” it’s easy to imagine that he would respond with his hands, a spade, a seedling and a bucket of water. William’s participation in the well-being of the world, of course, took many forms across his long life, and on scales of seed, syllable, and system. As longtime readers of Stories from the Garden know well, over our stewardship we’ve waded through the stuff of a fully engaged life. Not too long ago, we found a collection of old buttons (and a sheriff’s badge!) for national and global movements and moments. 

Late this summer we came upon a thick stack of photocopied flyers for “Friends of the Forest,” a grassroots organization “spontaneously founded in 1984 to protest the senseless conversion of Big Island native forests into woodchips for electrical power generation.” 

Even today, our daily trips to the post office box we once shared with William and Paula yield envelopes addressed to “William Merwin, Loyal Supporter” of a range of causes—care for refugees, endangered species protection, shelter for mistreated animals.

Just as William’s convictions took many forms over the course of his long life, they continue to do so through the actions and art of so many working on behalf of the world’s well-being. We see this in all who visit us here on the land, and in particular, through our residents. We hope you will spend time with the short video highlighting the extraordinary poet, theologian, and conflict mediator Pádraig Ó Tuama, and will look forward, with us, to having the writer and visual artist Rachel Eliza Griffiths join us here in the fall.

Just recently, Youtube’s algorithm suggested a clip I might find interesting, and indeed, I did: an episode of the PBS Literary Series A Moveable Feast with Tom Vitale, featuring W.S. Merwin. At the end of the episode Vitale asks: “What effect would you like your poetry to have on your readers?” William responds:

I would like it to make them feel that it had helped them come awake to something that they needed. And having wakened, that they stayed awake.

As we step into September, and think back to the beautiful virtual birthday gatherings and poetry readings we hosted over the years, we’re remembering William again this year in a new way; we invite you to tell us about a W.S. Merwin poem that has helped you waken to something. In celebration of William’s birthday, we will share those poems, along with your reflections.

With aloha,

Sonnet