A Narrative
By George Oppen
11
River of our substance
Flowing
With the rest. River of the substance
Of the earth's curve, river of the substance
Of the sunrise, river of silt, of erosion, flowing
To no imaginable sea. But the mind rises
Into happiness, rising
Into what is there. I know of no other happiness
Nor have I ever witnessed it .... Islands
To the north
In polar mist
In the rather shallow sea—
Nothing more
But the sense
Of where we are
Who are most northerly. The marvel of the wave
Even here is its noise seething
Copyright Credit: George Oppen, "A Narrative, Part 11" from New Collected Poems. Copyright © 1975 by George Oppen. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation.
Source: New Collected Poems (New Directions Publishing Corporation, 1975)