{"id":46,"date":"2015-08-25T03:14:03","date_gmt":"2015-08-25T03:14:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/eng528f15\/?page_id=46"},"modified":"2015-08-25T03:14:03","modified_gmt":"2015-08-25T03:14:03","slug":"rober-frost","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/eng528fa16\/texts\/rober-frost\/","title":{"rendered":"Robert Frost"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Mending Wall” (1914)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
\nThat sends the frozen-ground-swell under it
\nAnd spills the upper boulder in the sun,
\nAnd make gaps even two can pass abreast.
\nThe work of hunters is another thing:
\nI have come after them and made repair
\nWhere they have left not one stone on a stone,
\nBut they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
\nTo please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
\nNo one has seen them made or heard them made,
\nBut at spring mending-time we find them there,
\nI let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
\nAnd on a day we meet to walk the line
\nAnd set the wall between us once again.
\nWe keep the wall between us as we go.
\nTo each the boulders that have fallen to each.
\nAnd some are loaves and some so nearly balls
\nWe have to use a spell to make them balance:
\n“Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”
\nWe wear our fingers rough with handling them.
\nOh, just another kind of outdoor game,
\nOne on a side. It comes to little more:
\nThere where it is we do not need the wall:
\nHe is all pine and I am apple orchard.
\nMy apple trees will never get across
\nAnd eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
\nHe only says, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
\nSpring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
\nIf I could put a notion in his head:
\n“Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it
\nWhere there are cows? But here there are no cows.
\nBefore I built a wall I’d ask to know
\nWhat I was walling in or walling out,
\nAnd to whom I was like to give offense.
\nSomething there is that doesn’t love a wall,
\nThat wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him,
\nBut it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
\nHe said it for himself. I see him there,
\nBringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
\nIn each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
\nHe moves in darkness as it seems to me,
\nNot of woods only and the shade of trees.
\nHe will not go behind his father’s saying,
\nAnd he likes having thought of it so well
\nHe says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”<\/p>\n

“The Road Not Taken” (1916)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
\nAnd sorry I could not travel both
\nAnd be one traveler, long I stood
\nAnd looked down one as far as I could
\nTo where it bent in the undergrowth;<\/p>\n

Then took the other, as just as fair,
\nAnd having perhaps the better claim,
\nBecause it was grassy and wanted wear;
\nThough as for that the passing there
\nHad worn them really about the same,<\/p>\n

And both that morning equally lay
\nIn leaves no step had trodden black.
\nOh, I kept the first for another day!
\nYet knowing how way leads on to way,
\nI doubted if I should ever come back.<\/p>\n

I shall be telling this with a sigh
\nSomewhere ages and ages hence:
\nTwo roads diverged in a wood, and I-
\nI took the one less traveled by,
\nAnd that has made all the difference.<\/p>\n

“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” (1923)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whose woods these are I think I know.
\nHis house is in the village though;
\nHe will not see me stopping here
\nTo watch his woods fill up with snow.<\/p>\n

My little horse must think it queer
\nTo stop without a farmhouse near
\nBetween the woods and frozen lake
\nThe darkest evening of the year.<\/p>\n

He gives his harness bells a shake
\nTo ask if there is some mistake.
\nThe only other sound’s the sweep
\nOf easy wind and downy flake.<\/p>\n

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
\nBut I have promises to keep,
\nAnd miles to go before I sleep,
\nAnd miles to go before I sleep.<\/p>\n

“Design” (1936)<\/strong><\/p>\n

I found a dimpled spider, fat and white,
\nOn a white heal-all, holding up a moth
\nLike a white piece of rigid satin cloth —
\nAssorted characters of death and blight
\nMixed ready to begin the morning right,
\nLike the ingredients of a witches’ broth —
\nA snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth,
\nAnd dead wings carried like a paper kite.<\/p>\n

What had that flower to do with being white,
\nThe wayside blue and innocent heal-all?
\nWhat brought the kindred spider to that height,
\nThen steered the white moth thither in the night?
\nWhat but design of darkness to appall?–
\nIf design govern in a thing so small.<\/p>\n

“Provide, Provide” (1936)<\/strong><\/p>\n

The witch that came (the withered hag)
\nTo wash the steps with pail and rag,
\nWas once the beauty Abishag,<\/p>\n

The picture pride of Hollywood.
\nToo many fall from great and good
\nFor you to doubt the likelihood.<\/p>\n

Die early and avoid the fate.
\nOr if predestined to die late,
\nMake up your mind to die in state.<\/p>\n

Make the whole stock exchange your own!
\nIf need be occupy a throne,
\nWhere nobody can call you crone.<\/p>\n

Some have relied on what they knew;
\nOthers on simply being true.
\nWhat worked for them might work for you.<\/p>\n

No memory of having starred
\nAtones for later disregard,
\nOr keeps the end from being hard.<\/p>\n

Better to go down dignified
\nWith boughten friendship at your side
\nThan none at all. Provide, provide!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Mending Wall” (1914) Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it And spills the upper boulder in the sun, And make 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<\/p>\n