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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Winifred Waldron

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Hoofs

Winifred Waldron

BEWARE! …….. Beware!

Hark to the beat! The trampling beat!

Of the satyrs’ feet! Galloping feet!

Hark to the sound! The maddening sound!

They stamp the ground! They gash the ground!

The long grass tickles their legs, their heels!

They come in clattering swoops and reels!

Beware! …….. Beware!

Beware their hoofs! Their pounding hoofs!

Like hail on roofs! On rickety roofs!

They scatter the flowers! The fields of flowers!

In petalling showers! Yellow-red showers!

With crashing hammer and thud and pound

The satyrs leap in a whirling bound!

Beware! …….. Beware!

Their hoofs will shatter your garden walk!

Their pound will smother your cautious talk!

They’ll batter your red-geranium pot!

They’ll gut your cabbage and onion plot!

Hark from the hill!—the forest hill!

Where trees are still! ….. !

Hark to the beat! …… !

The laughter beat! The echoing beat

Of hammering feet! In the after heat

Of a clattering run, through miles of sun!

Beware! …….. Beware!