Tact

Over the brook’s seracs
two woven sets of tracks
half-filled with snow.

Any truth worth mentioning
is probably something we all know

far too well already
which we are laboring to obscure.

Along the south bank prints
under barberry—hints—
thorns blazed with fur.

—Michael Metivier

Seed: “Any truth worth mentioning is probably something we all know far too well already which we are laboring to obscure.”

Source: “Tact and the Poet’s Force,” by W. D. Snodgrass, from the lecture collected in his book In Radical Pursuit: Critical Essays and Lectures.

Michael Metivier is a freelance nonfiction editor, poet, essayist, and musician living in Vermont.