The Small Nouns Crying Faith

The Small Nouns Crying Faith

Phil Hall     The Small Nouns Crying Faith

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FIRST EDITION

Copyright ©2013 Phil Hall

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Cover image: From a case under the care of Dr. George Ogilvie. PLATE 15. – Instantaneous photograph showing bilateral athetosis in a case of cerebral diplegia; circa 1900, photographer unknown.

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The production of this book was made possible through the generous assistance of the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Hall, Phil, 1953-

The small nouns crying faith [electronic resource] / Phil Hall.

Electronic monograph in EPUB format.

Issued also in print format.

ISBN 978-1-927040-69-0

I. Title.

PS8565.A449S63 2013     C811'.54     C2013-901272-9 

Raw dear draw near

have patched pots wars cook crap in

a leaking stop-leak offer hoofs by

I · Remnant Road

Memoir

Verb wax

dainty density

if she’s crazy that spoils it

*

Pretoria: the land before the story

Patagonia: where all the dads go

*

How To Live On Nothing (1970)

Harmony

I. LEVEL

My complex friendship

with this oak table

from this pine chair / conducted

to smear anxious focus upon

these radiant equilibrium wolds

honed questless    grain to pulse

to try to widen down into

an affirming prudence

to revere & help sound

our one measure

II. SNOW LIGHT

The rain stopped after midnight

& the silence when I couldn’t sleep was snow

this morning the bulks of the engines are poised over clear rinks

I have been reading Lawrence poems & Whitman

& Duncan on Whitman    wishing the ardent gush came natural to me

sloppy form plain-said yet not fully gettable

I’m ice our Echo is mired grunt-stuck stolid in

(sand salt branches    bear-claws chains    gunning it    nothing)

my voice unbudged crimps its bent tootle

how bright the snow    how glaring the wide pity of my masters

as I dumb jokes & cheap observances pound thin as filo

betimes iffy sphere-music scrapes by

III. CHOIRED

They were all crazy perverts & drunks

devoted to gruesome wet coughs while discussing Blake

music has to be smoked from its hole & hit hard over the head