Part 9

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, That sends the frozen ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast. The work of hunters is another thing: I have come after them and made repair Where they have left not one stone on stone, But they would have the rabbit out of hiding, To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean, No one has seen them made or heard them made, But at spring mending-time we find them there. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill; And on a day we meet to walk the line And set the wall between us once again. We keep the wall between us as we go. To each the boulders that have fallen to each. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls We have to use a spell to make them balance: “Stay where you are until our backs are turned!” We wear our fingers rough with handling them. Oh, just another kind of out-door game, One on a side. It comes to little more: There where it is we do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, “Good fences make good neighbors.” Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder If I could put a notion in his head: “Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it Where there are cows? But here there are no cows. Before I built a wall I’d ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence. Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, That wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him, But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me, Not of woods only and the shade of trees. He will not go behind his father’s saying, And he likes having thought of it so well He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”

AFTER APPLE-PICKING

My long two-pointed ladder’s sticking through a tree Toward heaven still, And there’s a barrel that I didn’t fill Beside it, and there may be two or three Apples I didn’t pick upon some bough. But I am done with apple-picking now. Essence of winter sleep is on the night, The scent of apples: I am drowsing off. I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight I got from looking through a pane of glass I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough And held against the world of hoary grass. It melted, and I let it fall and break. But I was well Upon my way to sleep before it fell, And I could tell What form my dreaming was about to take. Magnified apples appear and disappear, Stem end and blossom end, And every fleck of russet showing clear. My instep arch not only keeps the ache, It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round. I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend. And I keep hearing from the cellar bin The rumbling sound Of load on load of apples coming in. For I have had too much Of apple-picking: I am overtired Of the great harvest I myself desired. There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch, Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall. For all That struck the earth, No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble, Went surely to the cider-apple heap As of no worth. One can see what will trouble This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is. Were he not gone, The woodchuck could say whether it’s like his Long sleep, as I describe its coming on, Or just some human sleep.

MY NOVEMBER GUEST

My Sorrow, when she’s here with me, Thinks these dark days of autumn rain Are beautiful as days can be; She loves the bare, the withered tree; She walks the sodden pasture lane.

Her pleasure will not let me stay. She talks and I am fain to list: She’s glad the birds are gone away, She’s glad her simple worsted grey Is silver now with clinging mist.

The desolate, deserted trees, The faded earth, the heavy sky, The beauties she so truly sees, She thinks I have no eye for these, And vexes me for reason why.

Not yesterday I learned to know The love of bare November days Before the coming of the snow; But it were vain to tell her so, And they are better for her praise.

MOWING

There was never a sound beside the wood but one, And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground. What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself; Perhaps it was something about the heat of the sun, Something, perhaps, about the lack of sound— And that was why it whispered and did not speak. It was no dream of the gift of idle hours, Or easy cold at the hand of fay or elf: Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows— Not without feeble-pointed spikes of flowers (Pale orchises)—and scared a bright green snake. The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows. My long scythe whispered and left the hay to make.

STORM FEAR

When the wind works against us in the dark, And pelts with snow The lower chamber window on the east, And whispers with a sort of stifled bark, The beast, “Come out! Come out!”— It costs no inward struggle not to go, Ah, no! I count our strength, Two and a child, Those of us not asleep subdued to mark How the cold creeps as the fire dies at length— How drifts are piled, Dooryard and road ungraded, Till even the comforting barn grows far away, And my heart owns a doubt Whether ’tis in us to arise with day And save ourselves unaided.

GOING FOR WATER

The well was dry beside the door, And so we went with pail and can Across the fields behind the house To seek the brook if still it ran;

Not loth to have excuse to go, Because the autumn eve was fair (Though chill) because the fields were ours, And by the brook our woods were there.

We ran as if to meet the moon That slowly dawned behind the trees, The barren boughs without the leaves, Without the birds, without the breeze.

But once within the wood, we paused Like gnomes that hid us from the moon, Ready to run to hiding new With laughter when she found us soon.

Each laid on other a staying hand To listen ere we dared to look, And in the hush we joined to make We heard—we knew we heard—the brook.

A note as from a single place, A slender tinkling fall that made Now drops that floated on the pool Like pearls, and now a silver blade.

THE CODE—HEROICS

There were three in the meadow by the brook, Gathering up windrows, piling haycocks up, With an eye always lifted toward the west, Where an irregular, sun-bordered cloud Darkly advanced with a perpetual dagger Flickering across its bosom. Suddenly One helper, thrusting pitchfork in the ground, Marched himself off the field and home. One stayed. The town-bred farmer failed to understand.

What was there wrong? Something you said just now. What did I say? About our taking pains. To cock the hay?—because it’s going to shower? I said that nearly half an hour ago. I said it to myself as much as you.

You didn’t know. But James is one big fool. He thought you meant to find fault with his work. That’s what the average farmer would have meant. James had to take his time to chew it over Before he acted; he’s just got round to act.

He _is_ a fool if that’s the way he takes me. Don’t let it bother you. You’ve found out something. The hand that knows his business won’t be told To do work faster or better—those two things. I’m as particular as anyone: Most likely I’d have served you just the same: But I know you don’t understand our ways. You were just talking what was in your mind, What was in all our minds, and you weren’t hinting. Tell you a story of what happened once. I was up here in Salem, at a man’s Named Sanders, with a gang of four or five, Doing the haying. No one liked the boss. He was one of the kind sports call a spider, All wiry arms and legs that spread out wavy From a humped body nigh as big as a biscuit. But work!—that man could work, especially If by so doing he could get more work Out of his hired help. I’m not denying He was hard on himself: I couldn’t find That he kept any hours—not for himself. Day-light and lantern-light were one to him: I’ve heard him pounding in the barn all night. But what he liked was someone to encourage. Them that he couldn’t lead he’d get behind And drive, the way you can, you know, in mowing— Keep at their heels and threaten to mow their legs off. I’d seen about enough of his bulling tricks— We call that bulling. I’d been watching him. So when he paired off with me in the hayfield To load the load, thinks I, look out for trouble! I built the load and topped it off; old Sanders Combed it down with the rake and said, “O. K.” Everything went right till we reached the barn With a big take to empty in a bay. You understand that meant the easy job For the man up on top of throwing down The hay and rolling it off wholesale, Where, on a mow, it would have been slow lifting. You wouldn’t think a fellow’d need much urging Under those circumstances, would you now? But the old fool seizes his fork in both hands, And looking up bewhiskered out of the pit, Shouts like an army captain, “Let her come!” Thinks I, d’ye mean it? “What was that you said?” I asked out loud so’s there’d be no mistake. “Did you say, let her come?” “Yes, let her come.” He said it over, but he said it softer. Never you say a thing like that to a man, Not if he values what he is. God, I’d as soon Murdered him as left out his middle name. I’d built the load and knew just where to find it. Two or three forkfuls I picked lightly round for Like meditating, and then I just dug in And dumped the rackful on him in ten lots. I looked over the side once in the dust And caught sight of him treading-water-like, Keeping his head above. “Damn ye,” I says, “That gets ye!” He squeaked like a squeezed rat.

That was the last I saw or heard of him. I cleaned the rack and drove out to cool off. As I sat mopping the hayseed from my neck, And sort of waiting to be asked about it, One of the boys sings out, “Where’s the old man?” “I left him in the barn, under the hay. If you want him you can go and dig him out.” They realized from the way I swobbed my neck More than was needed, something must be up. They headed for the barn—I stayed where I was. They told me afterward: First they forked hay, A lot of it, out into the barn floor. Nothing! They listened for him. Not a rustle! I guess they thought I’d spiked him in the temple Before I buried him, else I couldn’t have managed. They excavated more. “Go keep his wife Out of the barn.” Some one looked in a window; And curse me, if he wasn’t in the kitchen, Slumped way down in a chair, with both his feet Stuck in the oven, the hottest day that summer. He looked so mad in back, and so disgusted There was no one that dared to stir him up Or let him know that he was being looked at. Apparently I hadn’t buried him (I may have knocked him down), but just my trying To bury him had hurt his dignity. He had gone to the house so’s not to face me. He kept away from us all afternoon. We tended to his hay. We saw him out After a while picking peas in the garden: He couldn’t keep away from doing something.

Weren’t you relieved to find he wasn’t dead?

No!—and yet I can’t say: it’s hard to tell. I went about to kill him fair enough.

You took an awkward way. Did he discharge you?

Discharge me? No! He knew I did just right.

Hamlin Garland

TO A CAPTIVE CRANE

Ho, brother! Art thou prisoned too? Is thy heart hot with restless pain? I heard the call thy bugle blew Here by the bleak and chilling main (Whilst round me shaven parks are spread And cindered drives wind on and on); And at thy cry, thy lifted head, My gladdened heart was westward drawn.

O splendid bird! your trumpet brings To my lone heart the prairie springs.

THE MOUNTAINS ARE A LONELY FOLK

The mountains they are silent folk They stand afar—alone, And the clouds that kiss their brows at night Hear neither sigh nor groan. Each bears him in his ordered place As soldiers do, and bold and high They fold their forests round their feet And bolster up the sky.

MAGIC

Within my hand I hold A piece of lichen-spotted stone— Each fleck red-gold— And with closed eyes I hear the moan Of solemn winds round naked crags Of Colorado’s mountains. The snow Lies deep about me. Gray and old Hags of cedars, gaunt and bare, With streaming, tangled hair, Snarl endlessly. White-winged and proud, With stately step and queenly air, A glittering, cool and silent cloud Upon me sails. The wind wails, And from the cañon stern and steep I hear the furious waters leap.

Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

COLOR

A blue-black Nubian plucking oranges At Jaffa by a sea of malachite, In red tarboosh, green sash, and flowing white Burnous—among the shadowy memories That haunt me yet by these bleak northern seas He lives for ever in my eyes’ delight, Bizarre, superb in young immortal might— A god of old barbaric mysteries.

Maybe he lived a life of lies and lust, Maybe his bones are now but scattered dust; Yet, for a moment he was life supreme Exultant and unchallenged: and my rhyme Would set him safely out of reach of time In that old heaven where things are what they seem.

OBLIVION

Near the great pyramid, unshadowed, white, With apex piercing the white noon-day blaze. Swathed in white robes beneath the blinding rays Lie sleeping Bedouins drenched in white-hot light. About them, searing to the tingling sight, Swims the white dazzle of the desert ways Where the sense shudders, witless and adaze, In a white void with neither depth nor height.

Within the black core of the pyramid, Beneath the weight of sunless centuries, Lapt in dead night King Cheops lies asleep: Yet in the darkness of his chamber hid He knows no black oblivion more deep Than that blind white oblivion of noon skies.

TENANTS

Suddenly, out of dark and leafy ways, We came upon the little house asleep In cold blind stillness, shadowless and deep, In the white magic of the full moon-blaze: Strangers without the gate, we stood agaze, Fearful to break that quiet, and to creep Into the home that had been ours to keep Through a long year of happy nights and days.

So unfamiliar in the white moon-gleam, So old and ghostly like a house of dream It stood, that over us there stole the dread That even as we watched it, side by side, The ghosts of lovers, who had lived and died Within its walls, were sleeping in our bed.

GOLD

All day the mallet thudded far below My garret, in an old ramshackle shed Where ceaselessly, with stiffly nodding head And rigid motions ever to and fro A figure like a puppet in a show Before the window moved till day was dead, Beating out gold to earn his daily bread, Beating out thin fine gold-leaf blow on blow.

And I within my garret all day long Unto that ceaseless thudding tuned my song, Beating out golden words in tune and time To that dull thudding, rhyme on golden rhyme. But in my dreams all night, in that dark shed, With aching arms I beat fine gold for bread.

ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH

Against the green flame of the hawthorn-tree, His scarlet tunic burns; And livelier than the green sap’s mantling glee The spring fire tingles through him headily As quivering he turns

And stammers out the old amazing tale Of youth and April weather; While she, with half-breathed jests that, sobbing, fail, Sits, tight-lipped, quaking, eager-eyed and pale Beneath her purple feather.

BATTLE

THE GOING

He’s gone. I do not understand. I only know That as he turned to go And waved his hand, In his young eyes a sudden glory shone: And I was dazzled by a sunset glow, And he was gone.

THE JOKE

He’d even have his joke While we were sitting tight, And so he needs must poke His silly head in sight To whisper some new jest Chortling. But as he spoke A rifle cracked ... And now God knows when I shall hear the rest!

IN THE AMBULANCE

“Two rows of cabbages, Two of curly-greens, Two rows of early peas, Two of kidney-beans.”

That’s what he is muttering, Making such a song, Keeping other chaps awake, The whole night long.

Both his legs are shot away, And his head is light; So he keeps on muttering All the blessed night:

“Two rows of cabbages, Two of curly-greens, Two rows of early peas, Two of kidney-beans.”

HIT

Out of the sparkling sea I drew my tingling body clear, and lay On a low ledge the livelong summer day, Basking, and watching lazily White sails in Falmouth Bay.

My body seemed to burn Salt in the sun that drenched it through and through, Till every particle glowed clean and new And slowly seemed to turn To lucent amber in a world of blue....

I felt a sudden wrench— A trickle of warm blood— And found that I was sprawling in the mud Among the dead men in the trench.

THE HOUSEWIFE

She must go back, she said, Because she’d not had time to make the bed. We’d hurried her away So roughly ... and for all that we could say, She broke from us, and passed Into the night, shells falling thick and fast.

HILL-BORN

I sometimes wonder if it’s really true I ever knew Another life Than this unending strife With unseen enemies in lowland mud; And wonder if my blood Thrilled ever to the tune Of clean winds blowing through an April noon Mile after sunny mile On the green ridges of the Windy Gile.

THE FEAR

I do not fear to die ’Neath the open sky, To meet death in the fight Face to face, upright.

But when at last we creep Into a hole to sleep, I tremble, cold with dread, Lest I wake up dead.

BACK

They ask me where I’ve been, And what I’ve done and seen. But what can I reply Who know it wasn’t I, But someone, just like me, Who went across the sea And with my head and hands Slew men in foreign lands ... Though I must bear the blame Because he bore my name.

Richard Butler Glaenzer

STAR-MAGIC

Though your beauty be a flower Of unimagined loveliness, It cannot lure me tonight; For I am all spirit.

As in the billowy oleander, Full-bloomed, Each blossom is all but lost In the next— One flame in a glow Of green-veined rhodonite; So is heaven a crystal magnificence Of stars Powdered lightly with blue.

For this one night My spirit has turned honey-moth And has made of the stars Its flowers.

So all uncountable are the stars That heaven shimmers as a web, Bursting with light From beyond, A light exquisite, Immeasurable!

For this one night My spirit has dared, and been caught In the web of the stars.

Though your beauty were a net Of unimagined power, It could not hold me tonight; For I am all spirit.

Douglas Goldring

VOYAGES

I

To come so soon to this imagined dark— More velvet-deep than any midnight park! Palaces hem me in, with blind black walls; The water is hushed for a voice that never calls. My gondolier sways silently over his oar.

II