Resurrection Fern

The Resurrection Fern grows on the surface of tree trunks and limbs.  When water is scarce, the plant turns gray and curls up into itself, looking dead.  However, as soon as water touches the leaves, they straighten and become green again.  We humans often imitate nature, don't we?

Free

When despair grows in me 

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

 I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief.   I come into the presence of still water.  

 And I feel above me the day-blind stars

  waiting for their light.    For a time  

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. 

Wendell Berry