Did he say
anything?
Robert Forst
In winter he comes back to us. I'm done. "
"Sh! not so loud: he'll hear you," Mary said.
"I want him to: he'll have to soon or late. "
"He's worn out. He's asleep beside the stove.
When I came up from Rowe's I found him here,
Huddled against the barn-door fast asleep,
A miserable sight, and frightening, too--
You needn't smile--I didn't recognise him--
I wasn't looking for him--and he's changed.
Wait till you see. "
"Where did you say he'd been? "
"He didn't say. I dragged him to the house,
And gave him tea and tried to make him smoke.
I tried to make him talk about his travels.
Nothing would do: he just kept nodding off. "
"What did he say?
Did he say anything? "
"But little. "
"Anything? Mary, confess
He said he'd come to ditch the meadow for me. "
"Warren! "
"But did he? I just want to know. "
"Of course he did. What would you have him say?
Surely you wouldn't grudge the poor old man
Some humble way to save his self-respect.
He added, if you really care to know,
He meant to clear the upper pasture, too.
That sounds like something you have heard before?
Warren, I wish you could have heard the way
He jumbled everything. I stopped to look
Two or three times--he made me feel so queer--
To see if he was talking in his sleep.
He ran on Harold Wilson--you remember--
The boy you had in haying four years since.
He's finished school, and teaching in his college.
