I Wept When Horses Bit Me

For Katie Pauley

I watch them running, their manes

flowing in the wind like rain

coursing back from huge heads

and the lips flung away from

the awful yellowing teeth.

Sun moves through

the eyes of the horses.

Hunting something, their nostrils

enlarge in madness. They cry,

and the small valley echoes

the sound. Staring from this hill

I see them coming.

They are searching when they

find me, alone and quivering.

Structure

15 lines · 5 stanzas