Many kids are upset by this plan to kill deer in Mt. Lebanon. I believe they should be heard as well. I am willing to post their artwork or letters, with parents' permission, of course. I would rather not have their names associated with their artwork.
I received the following from a very upset parent.
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Four deer lift up their lovely heads to me
In the dusk of the golf course I plod across
Toward home. They're browsing the wet grass
The snow has left and, statued, stare at me
In deep silence and I see whatever light there is
Gather to glossy pools in their eight mild,
Barely curious but wary eyes. When one at a time
They bend again to feed, I can hear the crisp
Moist crunch of the surviving grass between
Their teeth, imagine the slow lick of a tongue
Over whickering lips. They've come from the unlit
Winter corners of their fright to find
A fresh season, this early gift, and stand
Almost easy at the edge of white snow islands
And lap the gray-green sweet depleted grass. About them
Hangs an air of such domestic sense, the comfortable
Hush of folk at home with one another, a familiar
Something I sense in spit of the great gulf of strangeness
We must look over at each other. Tails flicker
White in thickening dusk and I feel their relief
At the touch of cold snow underfoot while their faces
Nuzzle grass, as if, like birds, they had crossed
Unspeakable vacant wastes with nothing but hunger
Shaping their brains and driving them from leaf to
Dry leaf, sour strips of bark- under a thunder of guns
And into the cold comfort of early dark. I've seen
Their straight despairing lines cloven in snowfields
After storm, an Indian file of famished natives, poor
Unprayed-for wanderers through blinding chill, seasoned
Castaways in search of home ports, which they've found
At last here on the winter's edge between our houses and
Their trees. All of a sudden, I've come too close. Like
Birds they move as one mind, springing in silent waves
Over the grass, then cracking snow with sharp hard
Snaps, lightfooting it into the sanctuary of a pine grove
Where they stand looking back at me, a deer-shaped family
Of shadows against the darker arch of trees and this
Rusting dusk. When silence settles over us again and
They bow down to browse, the sound of grass being lipped,
Bitten, meets me across the space between us. Close
Enough for comfort, they see we keep, instinctively, our
Distance, sharing this air where a few last shards of day-
Light glitter in little meltpools or spread a skin of
Brightness on the ice, the ice stiffening towards midnight
under the clean magnesium burn of a first star.
I received the following from a very upset parent.
I saw a post earlier this evening pertaining to Lebo kids who are not involved....well here is my response....
This is a picture of my nine year old who wore her sticker from the protest when she went to school the day following the commissioner's meeting a few weeks ago. She told me that when she went into school wearing that sticker on her hat that a group of kids gathered around her and they started chanting "NO TO DEER KILLING!"...Yes, A group of fourth-graders! Both she and my 11-year-old ask me every morning when they wake up if I know if any more deer have been murdered. We were all thrilled this morning as we saw deer prints in the mud in our backyard and I saw one of our neighborhood deer running across the street as I walked out dog!
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Favorite poem:
Four Deer by Eamon Grennan
Four deer lift up their lovely heads to me
In the dusk of the golf course I plod across
Toward home. They're browsing the wet grass
The snow has left and, statued, stare at me
In deep silence and I see whatever light there is
Gather to glossy pools in their eight mild,
Barely curious but wary eyes. When one at a time
They bend again to feed, I can hear the crisp
Moist crunch of the surviving grass between
Their teeth, imagine the slow lick of a tongue
Over whickering lips. They've come from the unlit
Winter corners of their fright to find
A fresh season, this early gift, and stand
Almost easy at the edge of white snow islands
And lap the gray-green sweet depleted grass. About them
Hangs an air of such domestic sense, the comfortable
Hush of folk at home with one another, a familiar
Something I sense in spit of the great gulf of strangeness
We must look over at each other. Tails flicker
White in thickening dusk and I feel their relief
At the touch of cold snow underfoot while their faces
Nuzzle grass, as if, like birds, they had crossed
Unspeakable vacant wastes with nothing but hunger
Shaping their brains and driving them from leaf to
Dry leaf, sour strips of bark- under a thunder of guns
And into the cold comfort of early dark. I've seen
Their straight despairing lines cloven in snowfields
After storm, an Indian file of famished natives, poor
Unprayed-for wanderers through blinding chill, seasoned
Castaways in search of home ports, which they've found
At last here on the winter's edge between our houses and
Their trees. All of a sudden, I've come too close. Like
Birds they move as one mind, springing in silent waves
Over the grass, then cracking snow with sharp hard
Snaps, lightfooting it into the sanctuary of a pine grove
Where they stand looking back at me, a deer-shaped family
Of shadows against the darker arch of trees and this
Rusting dusk. When silence settles over us again and
They bow down to browse, the sound of grass being lipped,
Bitten, meets me across the space between us. Close
Enough for comfort, they see we keep, instinctively, our
Distance, sharing this air where a few last shards of day-
Light glitter in little meltpools or spread a skin of
Brightness on the ice, the ice stiffening towards midnight
under the clean magnesium burn of a first star.
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| Painted by 8 year old girl |
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| Age 6 |