The Names for Things

Give me the names for things, just give me their real names,
Not what we call them, but what
They call themselves when no one’s listening—
At midnight, the moon-plated hemlocks like unstruck bells,
God wandering aimlessly elsewhere.
                                                       Their names, their secret names. 

—Charles Wright, “The Writing Life,” Appalachia (1998)

(via A Poet Reflects)