Teachers Act Up!

Nouning, March 2020

V. The process of turning verbs and adjectives into nouns, also called nominalization.

 

What an awesome

spread!

 

Said at weddings,

even funerals,

 

of butter,

gossip,

 

wings,

two facing

 

newspaper pages.

What spreads.

 

We said this

for uncountable

 

nouns: acres,

days, contagious

 

smiles, laundered

tablecloths,

 

for gaps

between sellers’

 

asks and buyers’

bids. When panic

 

emptied grocery

shelves, cancelled

 

parades, rain checked

games, invitations,

 

we were spread

thinner, worked

 

from home,

returned, gloved

 

and masked to old

fashioned

 

verbing so as

not to spread

 

too much

of ourselves

 

around.