Pronghorn by Debra Nystrom

Pronghorn

 

Shadows appeared earliest in patches of rough, steep

drop below the far east ridge, where the bluffs

fell off first, and antelope

fed together at evening on sage and grama tufts

 

that took less heat than the fields up top

or the lower bluffs stretching out to the river,

bleached grass bending east in wind, lifting up

sometimes then bending again like the fur

 

of bigger animals a hand might’ve just passed over.

Their elegant necks angled down as everything sloped

toward the river more than a mile across there,

full of sandbars whose shapes

 

the water slowly rearranged, so no map

ever stayed exact.