"Don't name it, as they say, because instantly you offer it to this peculiar authority"

Robert Creeley’s observation, “Don’t name it, as they say, because instantly you offer it to this peculiar authority,” explores the relationship between language and authority, especially in the act of naming. To name something is not a neutral act; it asserts power over the thing named. Language doesn’t merely describe reality, it shapes and contains it. The process of naming is also the process of circumscribing; a thing that is named enters a social and conceptual order, subject to rules, interpretations, and expectations that arise from collective understanding.

Creeley’s phrase “peculiar authority” suggests the authority of convention, tradition, or even the collective unconscious, the web of meanings that society attaches to words and names. When something remains unnamed, it stays open, fluid, and ambiguous, able to slip beyond the reach of strict definition or consensus. But once it is named, it is captured, stabilized, and potentially diminished. The act of naming can provide clarity and communication but can also restrict, simplifying complexity to fit into pre-existing categories.

His warning evokes a poetic sensibility: by refusing to name, one resists the imposition of external meanings and leaves space for experience in its raw, unprocessed state. Poetry, for Creeley, resists over-definition, seeking to preserve moments of discovery, intensity, and wonder that can too easily be dulled by familiar language. In this way, naming can act as a form of surrender to social or cultural authority, giving up the “thing itself” in favor of its accepted symbol.

This reflection invites a mindfulness toward language, an awareness that words do not merely reflect reality; they also carry the weight of history and communal agreement. By refraining from immediate naming, we can encounter the world more directly, honoring complexity, strangeness, and possibility, free from the immediate, binding force of “authority.”