Among Lyn Lifshin’s forthcoming books: THE LICORICE DAUGHTER: MYYEAR WITH RUFFIAN,Texas Review Press and ANOTHER WOMAN WHO LOOKS LIKE ME. She has over 100 books & edited 4 anthologies. Her website:
  Her last two Black Sparrow books, COLD COMFORT and BEFORE IT’S LIGHT won Paterson Review Awards and Black Sparrow at David Godine will publish ANOTHER WOMAN WHO LOOKS LIKE ME.
  
  On April 17, 1972, at ten minutes to ten in the late evening, three days late, the only time she would be, Ruffian was born at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Kentucky. She was born with a star on her forehead, a sign of what she would become: the fastest filly, maybe the greatest horse of all time. From her record breaking maiden race, she left behind the best fillies and mares in races she ran and won almost effortlessly as she won stakes and broke records. She was ahead at every point of call. Ruffian was strikingly beautiful, more like his Black Stallion the writer Walter Farley said than any colt he'd seen, the image of The Black Beauty. An undefeated winner of lightning fast speed, Ruffian was Champion Juvenile filly of 1974. She was never headed, flew to breathtaking, stunning victories with a stride like no other horse, almost ghostly. Invincible until just after her Triple Crown win for fillies it seemed Ruffian didn't know how to lose. Then, in a tragic, misguided match race with the winner of the year's Kentucky Derby, the colt Foolish Pleasure, she broke down, even then in the lead by nearly a length. Even on three legs, thrusting her broken foreleg into the ground over and over, she could not easily be pulled up.
  No one who saw her can forget her. Ruffian was rare, perfect, spectacular, miraculous, bright and she is buried where no other horse has been buried, where she ran her first and last race at the infield at Belmont under the NYRA flag pole, her nose pointing, as it always did, toward the finish line.

 HORSES IN THE SNOW

 if you are still, you
can hear ice crystals
move like beads
in blackness, before
you see them stand.
Under a snow maple
their legs lift in the
ballet step, pas de
chevalle, shake the
cold off, huddling
like children or the
memory of children,
shapes dark as
the space snow angels
leave, their hooves
an angel's tiara.
Light glosses the
grey as steam from
the horses rises

BRIGHT APRIL OF BIRTH

3 days past her due date,
milk dripping from
Shenanigan's nipples.
Her coat is still dry
in the morning as she
eats as usual. Then, by
night, she starts packing
the breeding stall,
hay piled, her coat
damp and sweaty. May-
be there was a bright
moon, azaleas and
columbine. Suddenly
she begins rearranging
the straw with her
front foot, turning
and rearranging a
different pile till she
lies down, sighs.
Stars on her grey
flanks. When she
tries to get to her feet
she can't, rolls over,
her breath wild.
The foaling man
talks softly, shiny
instruments glisten.
Then her eyes open
in pain, surprise as two
small hoofs press thru,
then Ruffian's muzzle,
bony nose and finally
drenched in sweat
but calm, confident,
Shenanigans shudders
thru several hug
contractions and
Ruffian is nestled in
the thick hay

WITH STARLIGHT STILL ON THE POND LIKE SILVER

the fillies' and mares'
heads curl back. A
whinny at one end
of the barn travels
to the other. The
horses want to hang
on to what is familiar.
But as stars go off.
into cobalt sleep, the
men come to pull
Ruffian to the van on
her way to a new
life where she will
break records that
go back to the Civil
War to become a
horse that seems to
dance on water

WEANING DAY

 hinges creek on the gate.
Someone is coming too
early. Something is
unlatching the every
day, the warmth of their
mare, closeness of
her withers. Later, only
the road full of leaves
and stones. Something
is wrong. Their
mares can't save them.
Slats in the van. Colors
unseen in their six
months. Dust floats up
as if to blur everything
that was ordinary,
comforting. How could
the foals know, whinny-
ing and stamping, that
this happens every
year. Or that in the
new barn with only the
moon and stars for
company, in days they
will forget their mothers

IT WAS HER STRIDE, LONG, ALMOST DREAM LIKE, FLOATING

 riders with a sense of
pace were fooled.
She was like a dancer
with ballon, hanging
in the air, suspended.
If you were on her,
you thought the
clockers were wrong.
Sometimes it seemed
she wasn't running,
never came back
winded. Those long
legs seemed too
long for a real horse.
Someone said it
was as if she hung
there and the ground
rushed under her