'Cutting off the sky'

The Sleeping Giant, in Hamden and Wallingford, Conn.

"The whole day long, under the walking sun
That poised an eye on me from a high floor,
Holding my toy beside the clapboard house
I looked for him, the summer I was four.

I was afraid the waking arm would break
From the loose earth and rub against his eyes
A fist of trees, and the whole country tremble
In the exultant labor of his rise;

Then he with giant steps in the small streets
Would stagger, cutting off the sky, to seize
The roofs from house and home because we had
Covered his shape with dirt and planted trees....''

 

-- From "The Sleeping Giant: a hill in Connecticut,'' by Donald Hall