| |
| THERE overtook me and drew me in | |
| To his down-hill, early-morning stride, | |
| And set me five miles on my road | |
| Better than if he had had me ride, | |
| A man with a swinging bag for load | 5 |
| And half the bag wound round his hand. | |
| We talked like barking above the din | |
| Of water we walked along beside. | |
| And for my telling him where I’d been | |
| And where I lived in mountain land | 10 |
| To be coming home the way I was, | |
| He told me a little about himself. | |
| He came from higher up in the pass | |
| Where the grist of the new-beginning brooks | |
| Is blocks split off the mountain mass— | 15 |
| And hopeless grist enough it looks | |
| Ever to grind to soil for grass. | |
| (The way it is will do for moss.) | |
| There he had built his stolen shack. | |
| It had to be a stolen shack | 20 |
| Because of the fears of fire and loss | |
| That trouble the sleep of lumber folk: | |
| Visions of half the world burned black | |
| And the sun shrunken yellow in smoke. | |
| We know who when they come to town | 25 |
| Bring berries under the wagon seat, | |
| Or a basket of eggs between their feet; | |
| What this man brought in a cotton sack | |
| Was gum, the gum of the mountain spruce. | |
| He showed me lumps of the scented stuff | 30 |
| Like uncut jewels, dull and rough. | |
| It comes to market golden brown; | |
| But turns to pink between the teeth. | |
| |
| I told him this is a pleasant life | |
| To set your breast to the bark of trees | 35 |
| That all your days are dim beneath, | |
| And reaching up with a little knife, | |
| To loose the resin and take it down | |
| And bring it to market when you please. | |
| |
