I can see outdoors the gold wings without birds

Flying around, and the wells of cold water

Without walls standing eighty feet up in the air,

I can feel the crickets’ singing carrying them into the sky.

I know these shadows are falling for hundreds of miles,

Crossing lawns in tiny towns, and the doors of Catholic churches;

I know the horse of darkness is riding fast to the east,

Carrying a thin man with no coat.

And I know the sun is sinking down great stairs,

Like an executioner with a great blade walking into a cellar,

And the gold animals, the lions, and the zebras, and the pheasants,

Are waiting at the head of the stairs with robbers’ eyes.