The swinging mill bell changed its rate To tolling like the count of fate, And though at that the tardy ran, One failed to make the closing gate. There was a law of God or man
Out of the mud two strangers came And caught me splitting wood in the yard… And one of them put me off my aim By hailing cheerily “Hit them hard!” I knew pretty well why he had dropped be…
The white-tailed hornet lives in a ballo… That floats against the ceiling of the w… The exit he comes out at like a bullet Is like the pupil of a pointed gun. And having power to change his aim in fl…
Such a fine pullet ought to go All coiffured to a winter show, And be exhibited, and win. The answer is this one has been— And come with all her honors home.
One thing has a shelving bank, Another a rotting plank, To give it cozier skies And make up for its lack of size. My own strategic retreat
Square Matthew Hale’s young grafted app… Began to blossom at the age of five; And after having entertained the bee, And cast its flowers and all the stems b… It set itself to keep those three alive;
Let the downpour roil and toil! The worst it can do to me Is carry some garden soil A little nearer the sea. ’Tis the world-old way of the rain
The little old house was out with a litt… In front at the edge of the road where t… A roadside stand that too pathetically p… It would not be fair to say for a dole o… But for some of the money, the cash, who…
An ant on the tablecloth Ran into a dormant moth Of many times his size. He showed not the least surprise. His business wasn’t with such.
Where’s this barn’s house? It never had… Or joined with sheds in ring-around a do… The hunter scuffling leaves goes by at d… The gun reversed that he went out with s… The harvest moon and then the hunter’s m…
Something I saw or thought I saw In the desert at midnight in Utah, Looking out of my lower berth At moonlit sky and moonlit earth. The sky had here and there a star;
The grade surmounted, we were riding hig… Through level mountains nothing to the e… But scrub oak, scrub oak and the lack of… That kept the oaks from getting any girt… But as through the monotony we ran,
A boy, presuming on his intellect, Once showed two little monkeys in a cage A burning-glass they could not understan… And never could be made to understand. Words are no good: to say it was a lens
In a Vermont bedroom closet With a door of two broad boards And for back wall a crumbling old chimne… (And that’s what their toes are towards)… I have a pair of shoes standing,
The clouds, the source of rain, one stor… Offered an opening to the source of dew; Which I accepted with impatient sight, Looking for my old skymarks in the blue. But stars were scarce in that part of th…
Snow falling and night falling fast, oh,… In a field I looked into going past, And the ground almost covered smooth in… But a few weeds and stubble showing last… The woods around it have it—it is theirs…
A tree’s leaves may be ever so good, So may its bar, so may its wood; But unless you put the right thing to it… It never will show much flower or fruit. But I may be one who does not care
I have been treading on leaves all day u… God knows all the color and form of leav… Perhaps I have put forth too much stren… I have safely trodden underfoot the leav… All summer long they were over head, mor…
Roll stones down on our head! You squat old pyramid, Your last good avalanche Was long since slid. Your top has sunk too low,
Grief may have thought it was grief. Care may have thought it was care. They were welcome to their belief, The overimportant pair. No, it took all the snows that clung
The soil now gets a rumpling soft and da… And small regard to the future of any we… The final flat of the hoe’s approval sta… Is reserved for the bed of a few selecte… There is seldom more than a man to a har…
No speed of wind or water rushing by But you have speed far greater. You can… Back up a stream of radiance to the sky, And back through history up the stream o… And you were given this swiftness, not f…
I stole forth dimly in the dripping paus… Between two downpours to see what there… And a masked moon had spread down compas… To a cone mountain in the midnight haze, As if the final estimate were hers,
The people along the sand All turn and look one way. They turn their back on the land. They look at the sea all day. As long as it takes to pass
Some things are never clear. But the weather is clear tonight, Thanks to a clearing rain. The mountains are brought up near, The stars are brought out bright.
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth— Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right,
A bird half wakened in the lunar noon Sang half way through its little inborn… Partly because it sang but once all nigh… And that from no especial bush’s height; Partly because it sang ventriloquist
In the thick of a teeming snowfall I saw my shadow on snow. I turned and looked back up at the sky, Where we still look to ask the why Of everything below.
Wind the season-climate mixer In my Witches’ Weather Primer Says to make this Fall Elixir First you let the summer simmer, Using neither spoon nor skimmer,
A scent of ripeness from over a wall. And come to leave the routine road And look for what had made me stall, There sure enough was an apple tree That had eased itself of its summer load…
We sit indoors and talk of the cold outs… And every gust that gathers strength and… Is a threat to the house. But the house… We think of the tree. If it never again… We’ll know, we say, that this was the ni…
I said to myself almost in prayer, It will start hair raising currents of a… When you give it the livid metal-sap. It will make a homicidal roar. It will shake its cast stone reef of flo…
Some of you will be glad I did what I d… And the rest won’t want to punish me too… For finding a thing to do that though no… Yet wasn’t enjoined and wasn’t expected… To punish me over cruelly wouldn’t be ri…
The witch that came (the withered hag) To wash the steps with pail and rag Was once the beauty Abishag, The picture pride of Hollywood. Too many fall from great and good
I never dared be radical when young For fear it would make me conservative w…
The old dog barks backwards without gett… I can remember when he was a pup.
This biplane is the shape of human fligh… Its name might better be First Motor K… Its makers’ name—Time cannot get that w… For it was writ in heaven doubly Wright…
Let me be the one To do what is done.
Will the blight end the chestnut? The farmers rather guess not. It keeps smouldering at the roots And sending up new shoots Till another parasite
Let chaos storm! Let cloud shapes swarm! I wait for form.
On glossy wires artistically bent, He draws himself up to his full extent. His natty wings with self-assurance perk… His stinging quarters menacingly work. Poor egotist, he has no way of knowing
He has dust in his eyes and a fan for a… A leg akimbo with which he can sing, And a mouthful of dye stuff instead of a…
Never ask of money spent Where the spender thinks it went. Nobody was ever meant To remember or invent What he did with every cent.
I turned to speak to God About the world’s despair; But to make bad matters worse I found God wasn’t there. God turned to speak to me
It is late at night and still I am losi… But still I am steady and unaccusing. As long as the Declaration guards My right to be equal in number of cards, It is nothing to me who runs the Dive.
You like to hear about gold. A king filled his prison room As full as the room could hold To the top of his reach on the wall With every known shape of the stuff.
The bearer of evil tidings, When he was halfway there, Remembered that evil tidings Were a dangerous thing to bear. So when he came to the parting
One misty evening, one another’s guide, We two were groping down a Malvern side The last wet fields and dripping hedges… There came a moment of confusing lights, Such as according to belief in Rome
Why Tityrus! But you’ve forgotten me. I’m Meliboeus the potato man, The one you had the talk with, you remem… Here on this very campus years ago. Hard times have struck me and I’m on th…
The last step taken found your heft Decidedly upon the left. One more would throw you on the right. Another still—you see your plight. You call this thinking, but it’s walking…
Some one in ancient Mas d’Azil Once took a little pebble wheel And dotted it with red for me, And sent it to me years and years— A million years to be precise—
