#MIDDLEBURY
Earthy Anecdotes
Wallace Stevens
Every time the bucks went clattering
Over Oklahoma
A firecat bristled in the way.
Wherever they went,
They went clattering,
Until they swerved,
In a swift, circular line,
To the right,
Because of the firecat.
Or until they swerved,
In a swift, circular line,
To the left,
Because of the firecat.
The bucks clattered.
The firecat went leaping,
To the right, to the left,
And
Bristled in the way.
Later, the firecat closed his bright eyes
And slept.
About this poem
“Earthy Anecdotes” was published in Vol. 5, No. 6 of the magazine Others, in July of 1919.
About Wallace Stevens
Wallace Stevens was born in Reading, Penn., on Oct. 2, 1879. He published numerous collections of poetry, including “Harmonium” (Knopf, 1923) and “Collected Poems” (Knopf, 1954), which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1955. He died on Aug. 2, 1955.
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day@poets.org.
This poem is in the public domain. Originally published in Poem-a-Day, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.
