Poems by Rodney Torreson

Leaping Doe and Fawns Flash Before Us

by Rodney Torreson

From Canary Fall 2019

Rodney lives in Grand Rapids, along the Grand River, which Native Americans originally named O-wash-ta-nong, meaning “far-away-water” due to its length. Its rapids have been gone for well over a century, since the building of many dams in the mid-1800s, and “white caps” now more often refers to the city’s minor league team than waves cresting in white foam.

in foliage and street, on the fringe of this city,
deer we encroach on,
then fret over their lives spent
in a startle
we share in each encounter.

We settle for
trying to count them
instead of lingering over what it all
means when they show themselves late
and early in that interlude

when traffic’s not attacking Haines Street.
On the road and through open
spaces beneath
a maple’s canopy—
near the driveway we share
with neighbors—we spot them
far from airy reeds and water.

My wife says, grinning,
they’ve been eating her hostas.
The deer, gone in light, bristle
through the bare stems
they leave for us.

We imagine our scent tousled
within them, as if
they’re too taken with us.
Browsing my way back
into the stand of trees, I saturate
their bony bough and antler-like
branches with my scent, hoping
they’ll get over us and flee,

the doe at night impossibly hiding
fawns and herself
under the one hulking
maple.

September, when leaping begins
deeper in their bones,
the springing forth
flightier, doe and fawns
live inside the startle
and we recover counting
in the wake of quickening
headlights, the sets
of perked ears
that tarry for seconds
before fading.