The Moose by Elizabeth Bishop

The Moose

From narrow provinces   

of fish and bread and tea,   

home of the long tides

where the bay leaves the sea   

twice a day and takes

the herrings long rides,

where if the river

enters or retreats

in a wall of brown foam   

depends on if it meets   

the bay coming in,

the bay not at home;

where, silted red,

sometimes the sun sets   

facing a red sea,

and others, veins the flats’   

lavender, rich mud

in burning rivulets;

on red, gravelly roads,

down rows of sugar maples,   

past clapboard farmhouses   

and neat, clapboard churches,   

bleached, ridged as clamshells,   

past twin silver birches,

through late afternoon

a bus journeys west,

the windshield flashing pink,   

pink glancing off of metal,   

brushing the dented flank   

of blue, beat-up enamel;

down hollows, up rises,   

and waits, patient, while   

a lone traveller gives   

kisses and embraces

to seven relatives

and a collie supervises.

Goodbye to the elms,   

to the farm, to the dog.   

The bus starts. The light   

grows richer; the fog,   

shifting, salty, thin,

comes closing in.

Its cold, round crystals   

form and slide and settle   

in the white hens’ feathers,   

in gray glazed cabbages,   

on the cabbage roses

and lupins like apostles;

the sweet peas cling

to their wet white string   

on the whitewashed fences;   

bumblebees creep

inside the foxgloves,

and evening commences.

One stop at Bass River.   

Then the Economies—

Lower, Middle, Upper;   

Five Islands, Five Houses,

where a woman shakes a tablecloth   

out after supper.

A pale flickering. Gone.   

The Tantramar marshes   

and the smell of salt hay.   

An iron bridge trembles   

and a loose plank rattles   

but doesn’t give way.

On the left, a red light   

swims through the dark:   

a ship’s port lantern.   

Two rubber boots show,   

illuminated, solemn.   

A dog gives one bark.

A woman climbs in

with two market bags,   

brisk, freckled, elderly.   

“A grand night. Yes, sir,   

all the way to Boston.”   

She regards us amicably.

Moonlight as we enter

the New Brunswick woods,   

hairy, scratchy, splintery;   

moonlight and mist

caught in them like lamb’s wool   

on bushes in a pasture.

The passengers lie back.   

Snores. Some long sighs.   

A dreamy divagation   

begins in the night,

a gentle, auditory,

slow hallucination....

In the creakings and noises,   

an old conversation

—not concerning us,

but recognizable, somewhere,   

back in the bus:

Grandparents’ voices

uninterruptedly

talking, in Eternity:

names being mentioned,   

things cleared up finally;   

what he said, what she said,   

who got pensioned;

deaths, deaths and sicknesses;   

the year he remarried;

the year (something) happened.   

She died in childbirth.

That was the son lost

when the schooner foundered.

He took to drink. Yes.

She went to the bad.

When Amos began to pray   

even in the store and

finally the family had

to put him away.

“Yes ...” that peculiar   

affirmative. “Yes ...”

A sharp, indrawn breath,   

half groan, half acceptance,   

that means “Life’s like that.   

We know it (also death).”

Talking the way they talked   

in the old featherbed,   

peacefully, on and on,

dim lamplight in the hall,   

down in the kitchen, the dog   

tucked in her shawl.

Now, it’s all right now   

even to fall asleep

just as on all those nights.   

—Suddenly the bus driver   

stops with a jolt,

turns off his lights.

A moose has come out of

the impenetrable wood

and stands there, looms, rather,   

in the middle of the road.

It approaches; it sniffs at

the bus’s hot hood.

Towering, antlerless,   

high as a church,

homely as a house

(or, safe as houses).

A man’s voice assures us   

“Perfectly harmless....”

Some of the passengers   

exclaim in whispers,   

childishly, softly,

“Sure are big creatures.”   

“It’s awful plain.”   

“Look! It’s a she!”

Taking her time,

she looks the bus over,   

grand, otherworldly.   

Why, why do we feel   

(we all feel) this sweet   

sensation of joy?

“Curious creatures,”

says our quiet driver,   

rolling his r’s.

“Look at that, would you.”   

Then he shifts gears.

For a moment longer,

by craning backward,   

the moose can be seen

on the moonlit macadam;   

then there’s a dim

smell of moose, an acrid   

smell of gasoline.