“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting – over and over announcing your place in the family of things.
More to explore
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”
“Why I Wake Early Hello, sun in my face. Hello, you who made the morning and spread it over the fields and into the faces of the tulips and the nodding morning glories, and into the windows of, even, the miserable and the crotchety – best preacher that ever was, dear star, that just happens to be whe...”
“Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”
Explore over 387,000 quotes from your favorite books and authors.
Browse All Quotes