Henry Wadsworth Longfellow "The Cross of Snow" In the long, sleepless watches of the night, A gentle face--the face of one long dead-- Looks at me from the wall, where round its head The night-lamp casts a halo of pale light. Here in this room she died, and soul more white Never through martyrdom of fire was led To its repose; nor can in books be read The legend of a life more benedight. There is a mountain in the distant West That, sun-defying, in its deep ravines Displays a cross of snow upon its side. Such is the cross I wear upon my breast These eighteen years, through all the changing scenes And seasons, changeless since the day she died. Robert Frost "Out, Out - " The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood, Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it. And from there those that lifted eyes could count Five mountain ranges one behing the other Under the sunset far into Vermont. And the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled, As it ran light, or had to bear a load. And nothing happened: day was all but done. Call it a day, I wish they might have said To please the boy by giving him the half hour That a boy counts so much when saved from work. His sister stood beside him in her apron To tell them "Supper." At the word, the saw, As if it meant to prove saws know what supper meant, Leaped out at the boy's hand, or seemed to leap - He must have given the hand. However it was, Neither refused the meeting. But the hand! Half in appeal, but half as if to keep The life from spilling. Then the boy saw all - Since he was old enough to know, big boy Doing a man's work, though a child at heart - He saw all was spoiled. "Don't let him cut my hand off - The doctor, when he comes. Don't let him, sister!" So. The hand was gone already. The doctor put him in the dark of ether. He lay and puffed his lips out with his breath. And then - the watcher at his pulse took a fright. No one believed. They listened to his heart. Little - less - nothing! - and that ended it. No more to build on there. And they, since they
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow "The Cross of Snow" In the long, sleepless watches of the night, A gentle face--the face of one long dead-- Looks at me from the wall, where round its head The night-lamp casts a halo of pale light. Here in this room she died, and soul more white Never through martyrdom of fire was led To its repose; nor can in books be read The legend of a life more benedight. There is a mountain in the distant West That, sun-defying, in its deep ravines Displays a cross of snow upon its side. Such is the cross I wear upon my breast These eighteen years, through all the changing scenes And seasons, changeless since the day she died. Robert Frost "Out, Out - " The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood, Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it. And from there those that lifted eyes could count Five mountain ranges one behing the other Under the sunset far into Vermont. And the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled, As it ran light, or had to bear a load. And nothing happened: day was all but done. Call it a day, I wish they might have said To please the boy by giving him the half hour That a boy counts so much when saved from work. His sister stood beside him in her apron To tell them "Supper." At the word, the saw, As if it meant to prove saws know what supper meant, Leaped out at the boy's hand, or seemed to leap - He must have given the hand. However it was, Neither refused the meeting. But the hand! Half in appeal, but half as if to keep The life from spilling. Then the boy saw all - Since he was old enough to know, big boy Doing a man's work, though a child at heart - He saw all was spoiled. "Don't let him cut my hand off - The doctor, when he comes. Don't let him, sister!" So. The hand was gone already. The doctor put him in the dark of ether. He lay and puffed his lips out with his breath. And then - the watcher at his pulse took a fright. No one believed. They listened to his heart. Little - less - nothing! - and that ended it. No more to build on there. And they, since they
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