DEER

To lure a single swivel ear,

one tentative twig of a leg,

or a nervous tail here,

is to mark this place

as the emperor’s park,

rife, I say rife, with deer.

For if one leaf against the littered floor

be cleft with the true arc,

all this lost ground, and more,

becomes a park. Everywhere

the nearest deer signals the nearest dark.

A buck looks up: the touch of his rack

against wet bark whispers a syllable

singular to deer; the next one hears

and shifts; the next head stops

and lifts; deeper and deeper into the park