Stunning poem on the beauty of mystery

[Gabrielle Dean]

To the Unseeable Animal by Wendell Berry

My Daughter: “I hope there’s an animal
somewhere that nobody has ever seen.
And I hope nobody ever sees it.”

Being, whose flesh dissolves
at our glance, knower
of the secret sums and measures,
you are always here,
dwelling in the oldest sycamores,
visiting the faithful springs
when they are dark and the foxes
have crept to their edges.

I have come upon pools
in streams, places overgrown
with the woods’ shadow,
where I knew you had rested,
watching the little fish
hang still in the flow;
as I approached they seemed
particles of your clear mind
disappearing among the rocks.

I have walked deep in the woods
in the early morning, sure
that while I slept
your gaze passed over me.
That we do not know you
is your perfection
and our hope. The darkness
keeps us near you.

– Wendell Berry, in Art and Nature, an Illustrated Anthology of Nature Poetry. Wendell Berry is an American writer, poet, mystic, environmentalist, activist, farmer, etc….

I know I've used this pic before, but it suits a poem about something unseen but known.  It reminds me of a book I read a long time ago called The Nargun and the Stars, by Patricia Wrightson.set in the Australian bush.