Lastness

By Galway Kinnell b. 1927 Galway Kinnell

A black bear sits alone

in the twilight, nodding from side

to side, turning slowly around and around

on himself, scuffing the four-footed

circle into the earth. He sniffs the sweat

in the breeze, he understands

a creature, a death-creature,

watches from the fringe of the trees,

finally he understands

I am no longer here, he himself

from the fringe of the trees watches

a black bear

get up, eat a few flowers, trudge away,

all his fur glistening

in the rain.

And what glistening! Sancho Fergus,

my boychild, had such great shoulders,

when he was born his head

came out, the rest of him stuck. And he opened

his eyes: his head out there all alone

in the room, he squinted with pained,

barely unglued eyes at the ninth-month’s

blood splashing beneath him

on the floor. And almost

smiled, I thought, almost forgave it all in advance.

When he came wholly forth

I took him up in my hands and bent

over and smelled

the black, glistening fur

of his head, as empty space

must have bent

over the newborn planet

and smelled the grasslands and the ferns.

Source: Selected Poems (2001)

Biography

Galway Kinnell is an award-winning poet best known for poetry that connects the experiences of daily life to much larger poetic, spiritual, and cultural forces. Often focusing on the claims of nature and society on the individual, Kinnell’s poems explore psychological states in precise and sonorous free verse. The New York Times Book Review essayist Morris Dickstein called Kinnell "one of the true master poets of his . . .

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