99poems/naming

NAMING

I sit outside
with the dog, and
listen to the birds
I cannot name.
Lately something
yellow keeps swooping
past, too fast
for me to see.
And what we think
is a house finch
flits from the fence
to the century plant
before I can
find the camera.

Mother Nature
does not name,
of course.
So what she
makes has little
patience while
I try to.

We feel more present
when we proclaim
the name,
“Come look,
a finch is sitting
on the fence.”

A writer’s job
they say,
is to learn
the name
of everything.
The cloth you wear,
a thousand colors
for your hair.
The apples
we have left, and
the ones we’ve lost
already.

How does nature
get by in this
wordless place
where she cannot
brag about what
she’s done, because
she cannot say
its name.

4/20/99