Vermont Farm

AND all the love that there ever was
Between Granville Hill and the Valley of Flood
Is burned out now and gone and dead.
And the valley road is lost in weeds
And the cellar holes are caving in.

The same old brook runs across this road
Though its gully is choked with logs;
Occasional young stock nibble the grass
On Granville Hill that looks across
The ruined vale to the wooded peaks.
And so the slope has a cozy air,
Inviting to lie on in spite of the weeds
And dream of New England of former days.

Nobody drives on the narrow road,
Nothing alive but occasional flies
Mars the quiet of this old place.
It is desolate, ghastly, forbidding, forlorn,
And yet it is dear as it always was;
And private and intimate; precious as well.

The sacred land! The beloved hills!
The soil to return to — be buried in.