Small Nouns

This a poem of George Oppen’s, a favorite of my friend Randy. I had read Oppen and not had much sympathy for him until Randy showed me this one, in The New Collected Poems. But all of that is for another post. For now I just want to put this poem up.

Psalm

Veritas sequitur… 

In the small beauty of the forest

The wild deer bedding down

That they are there!

 

Their eyes

Effortless, the soft lips

Nuzzle and the alien small teeth

Tear at the grass

The roots of it

Dangle from their mouths

Scattering earth in the strange woods.

They who are there.

 

Their paths

Nibbled thru the fields, the leaves that shade them

Hang in the distances

Of sun

The small nouns

Crying faith

In this in which the wild deer

Startle, and stare out.