I know the panic of that wish to save the vital
knowledge of the old times,
handed down,
for it is rising off the earth, fraying away
in the wind and the coming day . . .
As you depart
toward the coming light, turn back
and speak, as the creek steps downward
over the rocks, saying the same changing
thing
in the same place as it goes . . .
- Wendell Berry, "The Record"