Rawhide

This is how you disappear
out between midnight,

called up under valleys
of torches and stars.

Foot, knee, shaggy belly, face
famous hindlegs,

as one of their own
you graze with them.

Cro-magnon herders
will stand in the wind,
sweeping tails shining,
and scaled to begin,

SHUTTING DOWN HERE
SHUTTING DOWN HERE-

-to where necks
leave the air
unpossesed

and giant heads lock
constellations.

A last grain of dust
lands in the darkness
on tongues laid bare,

and turning to chalk.

Shutting down here.

Freezing in red,
bent over his ice skin,
The insomniac gnaws
in the On-Offs;

he is glazed
in the hooves
all round.

It is losing its shape.
Losing its shape,
as the heat
in your hands
carve the muscle
away.

And he grins
from a break
in a backflash.

Delivers it up
on a break
in a backflash.

Motionless brands
burn into a hipframe
As a saviour
loads sightlines
backlit by fires,

on the ridges
of the highest
breeder

(Scott Walker "Rawhide" from Climate Of Hunter, 1984)