by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950)
The buck in the snow
Language: English
White sky, over the hemlocks bowed with snow, Saw you not at the beginning of evening the antlered buck and his doe Standing in the apple-orchard? I saw them. I saw them suddenly go, Tails up, with long leaps lovely and slow, Over the stone-wall into the wood of hemlocks bowed with snow. Now lies he here, his wild blood scalding the snow. How strange a thing is death, bringing to his knees, bringing to his antlers The buck in the snow. How strange a thing, — a mile away by now, it may be, Under the heavy hemlocks that as the moments pass Shift their loads a little, letting fall a feather of snow — Life, looking out attentive from the eyes of the doe.
Text Authorship:
- by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950), "The Buck in the Snow" [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Eric Ewazen (b. 1954), "The Buck in the Snow", 1983 [ high voice and piano ], from Four Lyrics of Edna St. Vincent Millay, no. 4 [sung text not yet checked]
- by Simon Sargon (b. 1938), "The buck in the snow", 1990 [ soprano, horn, and piano ], from Huntsman, What Quarry?, no. 2 [sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2021-02-09
Line count: 12
Word count: 126