“Any Place That’s Wild” John Muir

Any place that’s wild, John Muir,

     Oh, any place that’s wild;

I like you better, indeed I do,

Because you have said that which is true,

Because your being has burst its bars

And gone out under the trees and stars

     To a region undefiled.

Any place that’s wild, John Muir,

     That is the place to be;

Give me your hand in a grip of steel,

Silent, because I know how you feel,

And talk me the language of wood and stream,

Let me experience God’s own scheme

     Out there in his pastures free.

Any place that’s wild, John Muir,

     Oh, any place that’s wild;

Not the wild of the human hive

That buries a yearning soul alive,

Not the wild of the stock exchange,

But over the toilsome mountain range

     Created for nature’s child.

Jan. 27, 1917

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The Nebraska arrived at San Francisco, March 27th, and Muir lost no time there after he set foot on land. To his friends he was accustomed to relate, touches of humor, how he met on the street, the morning after debarkation, a man with a kit of carpenter's tools on his shoulders. When he inquired of him "the nearest way out of town to the wild part of the State," the man set down his tools in evident astonishment and asked, "where do you wish to go?" "Anywhere that's wild" was Muir's reply, and he was directed to the Oakland Ferry with the remark that that would be as good a way out of town as any.

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