Wendell Berry quote ✍️

Quote

If I was freer than I had ever been in my life, I was not yet entirely free, for I still hung on to an idea that had been set deep in me by all my schooling so far: I was a bright boy and I ought to make something out of myself... something else that would be a cut or two above my humble origins.
Poet’s word, with inverted comma, for the end of the day
?
E
?
E
?
N
Hint 1 meaning
The old plural of Eye.
Hint 2 anagram
NEE
Hint 3 another clue
AND STILL ___
7 +1

New Crossword Suggestion

Clue
Answer (solution)