Full text

Mowing

Project Gutenberg #3021 / #3026 / #29345

Source

Source: Project Gutenberg #3021 / #3026 / #29345 Source URL: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3021 Public domain basis: Frost’s first three books (1913–1916) via PG; US public domain. Coverage: Complete individual poem extracted from parent edition frost-early-poems at bytes 17295-18042; checksum 1f6dbf51b77f705bfda07cf5aba57f7ed658b815c3afb46ebd8e96c241997f43.

# Mowing

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 gold 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.