A child watches a horse standing by a fence post in dappled sunlight and notices small, concrete things—its brown coat, long still nose, chalky specks on its lip. When the horse opens its eyes, the speaker imagines it beginning to talk, not with sound but through its face and posture. The horse complains about the hot, slow day and the flies annoying its skin and eyes, then insists that being drab like the post doesn’t make it a post: it is a horse. Finally it closes its eyes and tells the child to go away. The mood is quiet, lazy, and gently humorous, mixing close observation with a childlike sense that animals have their own proud, slightly grumpy inner lives. The speaker seems curious, content, and a little amused by the horse’s silent dismissal.
Horse — Summary
His bridle hung around the post. The sun and the leaves made spots come down; I looked close at him through the fence; The post was drab and he was brown.
His nose was long and hard and still, And on his lip were specks like chalk. But once he opened up his eyes, And he began to talk.
He didn't talk out with his mouth; He didn't talk with words or noise. The talk was there along his nose; It seemed and then it was.
He said the day was hot and slow, And he said he didn't like the flies; They made him have to shake his skin, And they got drowned in his eyes.
He said that drab was just about The same as brown, but he was not A post, he said, to hold a fence. "I'm horse," he said, "that's what!"
And then he shut his eyes again. As still as they had been before. He said for me to run along And not to bother him any more.