Selected Poems

“As I walked out one harvest nightAbout the stroke of One,The Moon attained to her full heightStood beaming like the Sun.She exorcised the ghostly wheatTo mute assent in Love's defeatWhose tryst had now begun.The fields lay sick beneath my tread,A tedious owlet cried;The nightingale above my headWith this or that replied,Like man and wife who nightly keepInconsequent debate in sleepAs they dream side by side.Your phantom wore the moon's cold mask,My phantom wore the same,Forgetful of the feverish taskIn hope of which they came,Each image held the other's eyesAnd watched a grey distraction riseTo cloud the eager flame.To cloud the eager flame of love,To fog the shining gate:They held the tyrannous queen aboveSole mover of their fate,They glared as marble statues glareAcross the tessellated stairOr down the Halls of State.And now cold earth was Arctic sea,Each breath came dagger keen,Two bergs of glinting ice were we,The broad moon sailed between;There swam the mermaids, tailed and finned,And Love went by upon the windAs though it had not been.- ””

— Robert Frost

“Dying sun, shine warm a little longer!- ””

— Robert Frost

“To bring the dead to lifeIs no great magic.Few are wholly dead; Blow on a dead man's embersAnd a live flame will start. - ””

— Robert Frost

“From husks and rags and waste and excrementHe forms the pavement-feet and the lift-faces;He steers the sick words into parliamentTo rule a dust-bin world with deep-sleep phrases.When healthy words or people chance to dineTogether in this rarely actual scene,There is a love-taste in the bread and wine,Nor is it asked: "Do you mean what you mean?"But to their table-converse boldly comesThe same great-devil with his brush and tray,To conjure plump loaves from the scattered crumbs,And feed his false five thousands day by day.- ””

— Robert Frost

“A sullen pier-glass, cracked from side to side,Scorns to present the face (as do new mirrors)With a lying flush, but shows it melancholyAnd pale, as faces grow that look in mirrors.- ””

— Robert Frost

“The pen moved slowly upon paperAnd tears fell.He had written a name, yours, in printed letters:One word on which bemusedly to pore -No protest, no desire, your naked name,Nothing more.- ””

— Robert Frost

“Take your delight in momentariness,Walk between dark and dark - a shining spaceWith the grave's narrowness, though not its peace.- ””

— Robert Frost