Robert Frost: daily 5

A Minor Bird:

I have wished a bird would fly away,
And not sing by my house all day;

Have clapped my hands at him from the door
When it seemed as if I could bear no more.

The fault must partly have been in me.
The bird was not to blame for his key.

And of course there must be something wrong
In wanting to silence any song.


Acquainted With the Night:

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in the rain – and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right
I have been one acquainted with the night.


The Flower Boat:

The fisherman’s swapping a yarn for a yarn
Under the hand of the village barber,
And here in the angle of house and barn
His deep-sea dory has found a harbor.

At anchor she rides the sunny sod
As full to the gunnel of flowers growing
As ever she turned her home with cod
From George’s bank when winds were blowing.

And I judge from that Elysian freight
That all they ask is rougher weather,
And dory and master will sail by fate
To seek for the Happy Isles together.


Lost in Heaven:

The clouds, the source of rain, one stormy night
Offered an opening to the source of dew;
When I accepted with impatient sight
Looking for my old skymarks in the blue.

But stars were scarce in that part of the sky,
And no two were of the same constellation –
No one was bright enough to identify,

Seeing myself well lost once more, I sighed,
‘Where, where in Heaven am I? But don’t tell me!’
I warned the clouds, ‘by opening on me wide.
Let’s let my heavenly lostness overwhelm me.’


Moon Compasses:

I stole forth dimly in the dripping pause
Between two downpours to see what there was.
And a masked moon had spread down compass rays
To a cone mountain in the midnight haze,
As if the final estimate were hers,
And as it measured in her calipers,
The mountain stood exalted in its place.
So love will take between the hands a face…