Gerald Stern’s poem “One of the Smallest” was first published in the journal Poetry in January 1997. A four-page poem, it is the first section of six sections in Stern’s twelfth book of poetry, Last Blue, published in 2000. Stern did not start publishing poetry until 1971, when he was forty-six years old, but by 1973, he had received a National Endowment for the Arts grant to be a master poet for Pennsylvania, and he received numerous awards afterward, including the National Book Award in 1998 for his collection of poetry entitled This Time: New and Selected Poems. Last Blue was also well received as a continuation of Stern’s emotional, exuberant expression of himself in surreal images. Using the first person, the narrator becomes a sort of Everyman based on Stern’s own background and memories. “One of the Smallest” is typical of Stern’s work in that it includes abundant imagery taken from elements of the natural world such as animals, plants, and a river. A poem about death and rebirth, “One of the Smallest” follows a ray of sunshine through multiple locations and transformations as a life force that is compared to and connected with a person’s life span.