The Art of Creation: Surfeit of Glory

Still

by A.R. Ammons

I said I will find what is lowly
and put the roots of my identity
down there:
each day I'll wake up
and find the lowly nearby,
a handy focus and reminder,
a ready measure of my significance,
the voice by which I would be heard,
the wills, the kinds of selfishness
I could
freely adopt as my own:

but though I have looked everywhere,
I can find nothing
to give myself to:
everything is

magnificent with existence, is in
surfeit of glory:
nothing is diminished,
nothing has been diminished for me:

I said what is more lowly than the grass:
ah, underneath,
a ground-crust of dry-burnt moss:
I looked at it closely
and said this can be my habitat: but
nestling in I
found
below the brown exterior
green mechanisms beyond the intellect
awaiting resurrection in rain: so I got up

and ran saying there is nothing lowly in the universe:
I found a beggar:
he had stumps for legs: nobody was paying
him any attention: everybody went on by:
I nestled in and found his life:
there, love shook his body like a devastation:
I said
though I have looked everywhere
I can find nothing lowly
in the universe:
I whirled though transfigurations up and down,
transfigurations of size and shape and place:

at one sudden point came still,
stood in wonder:
moss, beggar, weed, tick, pine, self, magnificent
with being!
     From The Selected Poems: 1951-1977, Expanded Edition, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., Copyright © 1986 by A. R. Ammons.

The poem, Still, by A.R. Ammons reads a little like a failed New Year’s resolution. The speaker sets out to locate the most “lowly," the least important things he can find, in order to place himself under their mentorship, to take up their vantage point, and to learn from that humility.

Failure arrives, however, with his discovery that within even the lowliest parts of creation, there is a surfeit of glory. Moss, beggar, weed, tick, pine, self—all are magnificent in their existence in ways particular to them.

Underneath the ground crust of moss, he finds green mechanisms beyond the intellect. Within a physically and socially ravaged person, he finds love that shook his body like a devastation. Again and again he looks for something truly lowly and finds within each something unpredictable, something uncontainable, something awe-inspiring. He sums it up with these words:

I whirled though transfigurations up and down,
transfigurations of size and shape and place:

Casual observation is not enough to see past the lowliness of the exterior to this inner glory. Even looking closely is not enough. It is only when the speaker looks below the brown exterior, and when he nestles in that the glory of each lowly creature become visible.  Nestling in suggests more than just objective, emotionless observation. Nestling in implies physical and even emotional connection with something—a sustained curiosity and attachment that eventually reveals more than mere distant observation, no matter how careful, can achieve.

The poet Christian Wiman, speaking about the poetry of A.R. Ammons in light of Ammons' lack of religious faith said, “We come closer to the truth of the artist’s relation to divinity if we think not of being made subject to God but of being subjected to God—our individual subjectivity being lost and rediscovered within the reality of God. Human imagination is not simply our means of reaching out to God but God’s means of manifesting himself to us.”

So, even if we do not connect the glory we see around us to God, it does not mean that the glory is not a manifestation of God. I believe that to see and experience that glory increases our connection to God whether we recognize that reality or not.

If you are still looking for a goal for this new year, here is one worth considering: each day look for something around you that seems unimpressive and trivial. Then, get close enough and curious enough to see it as fully as you can. Nestle in. I wonder if you, like Ammons, will see and recognize a magnificence in existence in the creatures you become acquainted with in this way.

If you do attempt this, and discover a surfeit of glory in a way that surprises you, I would love to hear about it or see a picture of what you find.

You can purchase The Selected Poems of A.R. Ammons here.

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Louise