At the cold extremity of that November night
sudden sunflowers budded from the stone beach
where I lay dismantled there on the shore
victim of my lost faun’s fate.At the extreme of my despair on that cold night
flickering down the thicket slope lightly leaping
came the stag a white stag descending to the cove–
the old Wapiti Chief leaping down to driftwood.Bold of antennae, lord of all wave lengths,
he drank the moonwind off kelp and foal,
he devoured the shadows under shell and stone
before he came inquiring to my feet.Hail, Elk King! I cried, Hail Forest Lord!
Forgive me that I cannot rise to honor thee.
Drowned by my sorrows I lie shipwrecked here
too crippled to crawl to my knees.Three times the great stag circled where I lay,
three times pawed away the wet stones round my brow,
then silently kneeling beside my fatal wound
he laid his crown in my hands.All the pebbles were petaled where I stood.
