Caspar David Friedrich 1811. via Wikimedia Commons.
In winter in the woods alone
Against the trees I go
I mark a maple for my own
And lay the maple low.
At four o’clock I shoulder ax,
And in the afterglow
I link a line of shadowy tracks
Across the tinted snow.
I see for Nature no defeat
In one tree’s overthrow
Or for myself in my retreat
For yet another blow.
Robert Frost
We don’t have any snow right now, but this seems a very January poem nonetheless. I had thought that it was scheduled to post last year, but something happened and instead it was in the unpublished drafts folder. So, a bonus poetry post!
I love this.
I so much love Robert Frost’s poetry. I hadn’t come across this one before, so thank you for the delight.
I spent a month or two last year reading a Frost poem every day. I’d hoped to keep it up and get through the whole book, but I got distracted. Still, it was lovely and I came to appreciate his longer narrative poems for the first time.
I’d liked him before, but to really know a poet you really need to immerse yourself. I wish I had more time for such immersion.