First Day with Prancing Dan
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1We called him Prancing Dan,
my brother Raymond and me;
beautiful this restless horse
(his bright-copper sidestepping--
ballet-like, prairie style),
teenager like us, as horses go,
Nebraska–born too,
bred on whirlwind-dust and knobby hail,
harnessed too young, like us
(men by necessity).
2Now teamed with a veteran mare,
bit in his teeth as pride commanded,
he gritted his way through morning,
the long blade of his mowing-machine
laying cut-down stems of wheat like carpet,
re-coloring the yellowing field
till noon.
3At the water-tank
Dan’s nose plunged first and deeper,
the mare’s downreined by harness laws,
both circling blowbubbles,
his upsnorted
as if to shake out ditties
from his leathered chains.
4The afternoon, all his,
surrendered with elegance:
an orange-and-purple butterfly,
settling on his perky mane,
rode plume with him home.
5Copyright © 2008 by James A. Emanuel. All rights reserved.
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James A. Emanuel, « First Day with Prancing Dan », Transatlantica [En ligne], 1 | 2009, mis en ligne le 23 juin 2009, consulté le 28 mars 2024. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/transatlantica/4261 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/transatlantica.4261
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