last light of the sun
that had died in the west still
lived for one song more
As I came to the edge of the woods,
Thrush music — hark!
Now if it was dusk outside,
Inside it was dark.
Too dark in the woods for a bird
By sleight of wing
To better its perch for the night,
Though it still could sing.
The last of the light of the sun
That had died in the west
Still lived for one song more
In a thrush’s breast.
Far in the pillared dark
Thrush music went—
Almost like a call to come in
To the dark and lament.
But no, I was out for stars:
I would not come in.
I meant not even if asked,
And I hadn’t been.
Come In by Robert Frost in A Witness Tree, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1942.
The scene is the island road on Pinckney Island, South Carolina.
The Pinckney Island National Wildlife Refuge is a 4,053-acre (16 km2) National Wildlife Refuge located in Beaufort County, South Carolina between the mainland and Hilton Head Island.
The refuge is one of seven refuges administered by the Savannah Coastal Refuges Complex in Savannah, Georgia.
In a partial review on Wikipedia, Harriet Monroe of Poetry Magazine noted that Frost is most interested in “showing the human reaction to nature’s processes.
But no, I was out for stars:
I would not come in.
I meant not even if asked,
And I hadn’t been.
No Haiku For You 