Robert Frost: The Wood-Pile

Out walking in the frozen swamp one gray day, 

I paused and said, ‘I will turn back from here. 

No, I will go on farther—and we shall see.’ 

The hard snow held me, save where now and then 

One foot went through. The view was all in lines 

Straight up and down of tall slim trees 

Too much alike to mark or name a place by 

So as to say for certain I was here 

Or somewhere else: I was just far from home. 

A small bird flew before me. He was careful 

To put a tree between us when he lighted, 

And say no word to tell me who he was 

Who was so foolish as to think what he thought. 

He thought that I was after him for a feather— 

The white one in his tail; like one who takes 

Everything said as personal to himself. 

One flight out sideways would have undeceived him. 

And then there was a pile of wood for which 

I forgot him and let his little fear 

Carry him off the way I might have gone, 

Without so much as wishing him good-night. 

He went behind it to make his last stand. 

It was a cord of maple, cut and split 

And piled—and measured, four by four by eight. 

And not another like it could I see. 

No runner tracks in this year’s snow looped near it. 

And it was older sure than this year’s cutting, 

Or even last year’s or the year’s before. 

The wood was gray and the bark warping off it 

And the pile somewhat sunken. Clematis 

Had wound strings round and round it like a bundle. 

What held it though on one side was a tree 

Still growing, and on one a stake and prop, 

These latter about to fall. I thought that only 

Someone who lived in turning to fresh tasks 

Could so forget his handiwork on which 

He spent himself, the labor of his ax, 

And leave it there far from a useful fireplace 

To warm the frozen swamp as best it could 

With the slow smokeless burning of decay. 

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Public Domain. This poem first appeared in North of Boston by Robert Frost in 1914.

Note: As Amy Nawrocki writes, “In the often overlooked poem ‘The Wood-Pile,’ Robert Frost explores the human life cycle, particularly the process of aging. The speaker is in a middle stage of life, about to embark on the winter of old age, which corresponds to the setting of the poem.”