Small Things Hide Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

small things hide in You; the things that are not revered

though they were created some of them at least

on the First Day.

creeping things get in the way even of the ferns.

but I discern on any random summer evening

snail tracks on the moon all made of silver.

wings of a fine rust.

on earth they must they take shelter how they can under a broadleaf in a rain puddle.

and have wistful dreams of one day living in another phyla,

kingdom where the kind and storybook princess arrives

in her nutshell carriage striped gold

and gives them favour.

I weep for small things. spotted, on the ridge roof rainbow motes.

unknown in their desertions. for how they get swept down drain pipes

tin soldiers on their way with a tiny kind of valour

that flickers like the flame of a lost thing too all suddenly firefly

floating fleeting in a foreign neighborhood with no echo home

when I am lost in the woods myself so far

far from the stone cutter's cottage.

mary angela douglas `15 august 2020