The speaker starts with a small observation: the oaks have dropped so many acorns that walking over them feels like stepping on ball bearings. Then the poem narrows its focus to a single acorn whose cap has come off, so that a "blank face" gains a split. From there the speaker imagines what that moment might feel like from the inside. The split looks like a mouth, and having "the only mouth" seems lonely. The questions that follow are playful and tender. Does the acorn breathe? Does it invent eating? Does it look for another broken soul and offer a "minimal kiss"?
The mood is gentle, curious, and a little wistful. The speaker treats the cracked acorns as tiny, vulnerable creatures, but the ending shifts the tone toward hope. The speaker tells them to wait, because soon they will all wake and send a "yellow tongue" into the earth. The splitting that looked like damage turns out to be the start of growth, which is the first sign of a new tree.