Horse By Elizabeth Madox Roberts

His bridle hung around the post.
The sun and the leaves made spots come down;
I looked close at him through the fence;
The post was drab and he was brown.
His nose was long and hard and still,
And on his lip were specks like chalk.
But once he opened up his eyes,
And he began to talk.
He didn’t talk out with his mouth;
He didn’t talk with words or noise.
The talk was there along his nose;
It seemed and then it was.
He said the day was hot and slow,
And he said he didn’t like the flies;
They made him have to shake his skin,
And they got drowned in his eyes.
He said that drab was just about
The same as brown, but he was not
A post, he said, to hold a fence.
“I’m horse,” he said, “that’s what!”
And then he shut his eyes again.
As still as they had been before.
He said for me to run along
And not to bother him any more.