Muorre-ûnderhâld
Der is wat dat net oer in muorre mei,
Dat froast stjoert dêr’t de ûndergrûn fan tynt,
De flinten boppe-op ferwaarje lit
En bressen slacht, foar twa sels bredernôch.
Wat jagers dogge, giet it hjir net om:
Ik rin se nei, lis stiennen wer teplak
Dy’t sy net op mekoarren litten ha,
Omdat de meute los moast op it knyn
Dat skûle. Mar net ien hat heard of sjoen
Wat skuld hat oan de skea dy’t ik bedoel,
De gatten dy’t wy elk jier maitiids tichtsje.
Ik doch myn buorman jinsen wer berjocht,
Wy prate ôf en rinne ’t skied bylâns
En bouwe de muorre tusken ús wer op.
Al dwaande hâlde wy dy tusken ús.
Elk docht de flinten lizzend op syn helte.
Guon binne kantich, oaren hast sa rûn
Dat in beswarring se balâns jaan moat:
‘Bliuw lizzen oant wy dy de rêch takeare!’
’t Hantearjen makket ús de fingers rou.
Och, ’t is in soart fan wedstriid bûtendoar,
Elk oan in kant. Mear is it winlik net:
Wêr’t muorre is, hie it wol sûnder kind:
Hy docht yn dinnen, ik bin appelhôf.
Nea stekt, sis ik, ien fan myn beamkes oer
En yt ien fan syn dinne-appels op.
Syn antwurd: ‘Goede muorren, goede buorren.’
Tsjinstribbich troch de maitiid bin ’k benijd
Oft ik him ta wat ynsjoch bringe kin:
‘Liedt dit ta goede buorlju? Soks jildt dochs
Foar lân mei kij? Hjir is gjin ko te sjen.
Ik soe gjin muorre bouwe foar’t ik wist
Wat ik dêrmei dan yn- of bûtensleat
En wa’t ik mooglik argewaasje joech.
Der is wat dat net oer in muorre mei,
Him sljochtsje wol.’ Hast hie ik ‘Elven’ sein,
Mar elven binne ’t no krekt net, en leafst
Woe ik dat hy dêr sels mei kaam. Ik sjoch
Him stiennen tôgjen, ien yn elke hân,
Lykas in stientiidman syn wapentúch.
Hy spaant, komt it my foar, yn tsjuster om
Dat mear is as it skaad fan beam en bosk.
Foarby syn heite spreuk sil er net gean
En dat er dêr oan tocht hat, noasket him,
Wer seit er: ‘Goede muorren, goede buorren.’
Mending Wall
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!’
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
‘Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down.’ I could say ‘Elves’ to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’
Ut North of Boston, 1914