You said you would kill it this morning.
Do not kill it. It startles me still,
The jut of that odd, dark head, pacing Through the uncut grass on the elm's hill.
It is something to own a pheasant,
Or just to be visited at all. I am not mystical: it isn't
As if I thought it had a spirit.
It is simply in its element. That gives it a kingliness, a right.

"Pheasant" - Winter Trees (1972)