Substantive

poem by Ruth Salles

All all
that exists in the world,
– the stone and the plant,
the beast and the man –
everything has a name:
it's the substantive!

so named,
the created things
seem more alive.
There are higher ones,
they hold their heads high;
with capital letter
is that they start.
are names of people
– Lucinha, Fernando –
are our pets
– Toto and Pussy –
are land names,
of rivers, mountains
– Sao Paulo, Amazonas,
the Andes, Spain.
proper noun
is the name they have;
proper of place
or someone else's.

if everything in the world
by God was created,
the name of everything
by man was given.

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