Chasing The Wild

The forest vibrates with the sound
Of running horses between trees:
The melody of hooves on ground,
Noses lifted to catch the breeze.

The men upon these horses' backs
Have hunted every inch of wood,
Know the land's strangest ways and tracks,
Know where natural traps have stood

For as long as they have lived here.
But never have they seen the thing
That crouches there and then leaps clear,
Running fleet as a bird on wing.

Calling to each other, they ride,
Pursuing the gray phantom shade
That moves at a swift soaring glide
From path to pool, from glen to glade.

Shattering the water's bright glass,
Darting, moving with royal speed,
This animal is king of grass,
And the forest from tree to seed.

It pauses at last in a glen.
Its eyes are like no song on earth.
The hunters never will again
See a wolf that such regal mirth

Combines with such kingly gray grace,
Such silver lupine perfection.
Each soft-grassed and watery place
Ripples with a soft reflection.

Prince of the forest, shining host
Of the hunters who abashed stare,
He flits away then, like a ghost.
And then the sound of hooves the air

Rends! Another prince of their prey
Darts and spirals of them ahead,
His coat like a shard of the day,
His voice a call that wakes the dead

For such a bugle is contained
In the voice of a wild stallion.
He runs with beauty that has pained
More than one heart; like a galleon

He sets sail from only one port.
And the man he finds as master
Must be a man of other sort:
For one thing, he must run faster.

Sharp flashing gold between the trees,
And singing hooves on the leaf mold,
Than eagle on air or fish in seas
Smoother runs this stallion of gold.

	At last he pauses, just ahead,
	And calls a last crystal fanfare.
	The men can see him- they stop dead
	And gape at what is waiting there.

	Like a hill of treasure hoarded,
	Like a glittering beast of dreams,
	With gold and gems he is chorded,
	And from him light in limpid streams

	Flows outward. The hunters can stare,
	And master horses shrieking in fright.
	But no force known can from the air
	Keep a dragon. His brilliant flight

	Makes them cower, causes flinching.
	He wheels above like a swallow,
	And then when they are still wincing,
	His wings calling, Follow, follow,

	He flies away over the trees.
	The hunters swiftly leave that place,
	And gallop through the singing seas
	Of leaves left in his wake of grace.

	They can see him, barely ahead.
	They can hear the music his wings
	Leave behind in clearings dew-fed.
	They can hear the jade tune that sings

	Down from a dragon of gold-green.
	Ablaze with his radiant power,
	The loveliest thing they have seen
	In many a wild-chasing hour,

	They follow him. He dives and soars.
	His wings create a glowing breeze
	That cuts open their hearts' deep cores,
	And makes them bloom like sapling trees.

	He comes to ground for the last time.
	The hunters may not want to kill
	This vision that makes their minds chime.
	But they follow; they follow still.

	And then they cry out, one by one,
	Beholding him as he transforms.
	Violently beautiful, to stun
	Them all, he is a unicorn.

	Lion's tail and curling goat-beard,
	Cloven hooves all carven of foam,
	His image on their eyes is seared.
	He fades into his forest home.

	But his image is all they see,
	Then or for many hours after.
	The crystal horn that commands: Be!
	And the weeping, and the laughter

	As trees cry and shed their poor leaves,
	And flowers fling themselves to die
	Beneath his hooves, in ecstasies.
	A unicorn is trotting by.

	From tail to hooves, from beard to call,
	He is the purest form of light.
	All creatures seeing him dying fall.
	He is the harp note of starlight.

	Light, and light, and light once again!
	Radiance falls from him in floods.
	Oh most blessed and most wretched of men,
	To see a unicorn in the woods!

	And one of them from then on blind
	Was, needing help to find his way.
	Another was pushed from his mind,
	And gently rocked himself all day.

	A third a bard with golden throat
	Became, though fragile as a swan.
	The last vanished. He left a note
	That said: I go to find the dawn.