Page 26 of Collected Poems
frantic blast of iron voice
shattered their stately march, then
recoiled brutally to my heart
as he gathered in hasty panic
the heaviness of his hind
quarters, so ungainly in his
hurry, and flung it desperate
beyond my monstrous
reach. I should have felt unworthy then
playing such pranks on the noble
elder and watching his hallowed
waist cloth came undone had not
his singer fared so well…. Two
quick hops, a flap of
wings and he was
safe posture intact on
brown laterite…. I could not
bear him playing so
faithfully my faithless agility-man, my
scrambler to safety, throat dilated
still by remnant praises
of his excellency high-headed
in delusion marching now alone
into death's ambush…. We were
spared, the bull and I, in our separate follies….
His routed sunrise procession
no doubt would reform beyond the clamor
of my passage and sprightly
egret take up again
his broken adulation
