The speaker addresses a "man" and asks whether he was the one lurking by the barn on a quiet spring morning. While the speaker smells the tulips, a black gander is shot, or at least struck, and falls out of the sky. It dives into the water, grabs hold of the weeds at the bottom, and stays there until it drowns. All the while the hunter, hidden in his blind, curses and sweats.
The poem sets two scenes side by side: the soft, fresh image of tulips and the violent, drawn-out death of a bird. The speaker seems shaken, even accusing. The opening question suggests unease about who was watching, and whether anyone who stood by shares some blame. The short, broken lines slow the action down, so the fall and the drowning feel almost unbearably long. The mood is quietly disturbing, and the final image of the sweating hunter leaves a sense of ugliness beneath the springtime calm.