Monday, September 15, 2008

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

An excerpt from a poem from Wendell Berry. Find the entire poem here

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.

When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.

Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.


1 comment:

gregjarrell said...

I love the last line there about ignorance. Also one towards the end: "As soon as the generals and the politicos/ cand predict the motions of your mind,/ lose it."

Wendell Berry is my favorite - I read A Timbered Choir more often than I read the Bible.