The Deer

I looked up and saw a shadow falling,

A soft cascade across a sloping moonlit hill,

And heard a sound of thunder so steady,

and soft,

that I stopped my wandering just to listen— still.

But there it was, the soft cascade still growing,

the trampled corn stalks now razed all the more,

and its absence after all my breath had gone so hushed

and low,

left life in such a tremble as I'd never felt before.

The thunder and the sweep of dusk

that, sailing, graced my sight,

was the rumbling of the stags,

gentle,

and proud;

and there I stood, so wholly captivated by their flight—

by the emblem of their egress, bright and loud.

And after that, just silence.

Hark—

stillness.

Silence is a thunderous sound.