SUBURBAN NOCTURNE

On this level plot of ground, almost a square

Except for the five-foot stretch behind the house

Where hemlock and lilac screen the neighbors,

An Algonquian chief and eight of his tribe,

Exhausted from stalking the scattering deer,

Lay down at dusk beside spent horses

And slept, uneasy sprawled around a fire.

Perhaps there was one who kept on riding,

Riding, riding the deer, the creeks and ditches,

Who leapt with the deer to a deeper forest

And dark, deadlocked in branches and antlers,

Awoke, astonished, to hunt among the stars.