Poem: “The White-Footed Deer” by William Cullen Bryant

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American Literature – American Poetry – William Cullen Bryant – Poems from William Cullen Bryant
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The White-Footed Deer

It was a hundred years ago,
    When, by the woodland ways,
The traveller saw the wild deer drink,
    Or crop the birchen sprays.

Beneath a hill, whose rocky side
    O’erbrowed a grassy mead,
And fenced a cottage from the wind,
    A deer was wont to feed.

She only came when on the cliffs
    The evening moonlight lay,
And no man knew the secret haunts
    In which she walked by day.

White were her feet, her forehead showed
    A spot of silvery white,
That seemed to glimmer like a star
    In autumn’s hazy night.

And here, when sang the whippoorwill,
    She cropped the sprouting leaves,
And here her rustling steps were heard
    On still October eves.

But when the broad midsummer moon
    Rose o’er that grassy lawn,
Beside the silver-footed deer
    There grazed a spotted fawn.

The cottage dame forbade her son
    To aim the rifle here;
“It were a sin,” she said, “to harm
    Or fright that friendly deer.

“This spot has been my pleasant home
    Ten peaceful years and more;
And ever, when the moonlight shines,
    She feeds before our door.

“The red men say that here she walked
    A thousand moons ago;
They never raise the war-whoop here,
    And never twang the bow.

“I love to watch her as she feeds,
    And think that all is well
While such a gentle creature haunts
    The place in which we dwell.”

The youth obeyed, and sought for game
    In forests far away,
Where, deep in silence and in moss,
    The ancient woodland lay.

But once, in autumn’s golden time,
    He ranged the wild in vain,
Nor roused the pheasant nor the deer,
    And wandered home again.

The crescent moon and crimson eve
    Shone with a mingling light;
The deer, upon the grassy mead,
    Was feeding full in sight.

He raised the rifle to his eye,
    And from the cliffs around
A sudden echo, shrill and sharp,
    Gave back its deadly sound.

Away into the neighbouring wood
    The startled creature flew,
And crimson drops at morning lay
    Amid the glimmering dew.

Next evening shone the waxing moon
    As sweetly as before;
The deer upon the grassy mead
    Was seen again no more.

But ere that crescent moon was old,
    By night the red men came,
And burnt the cottage to the ground,
    And slew the youth and dame.

Now woods have overgrown the mead,
    And hid the cliffs from sight;
There shrieks the hovering hawk at noon,
    And prowls the fox at night.

< < < The Crowded Street
The Waning Moon > > >

American Literature – American Poetry – William Cullen Bryant – Poems from William Cullen Bryant

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The White-Footed Deer

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