THE IMPULSE
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t was too lonely for her there,And too wild,And since there were but two of them,And no child, And work was little in the house,She was free,And followed where he furrowed field,Or felled tree. She rested on a log and tossedThe fresh chips,With a song only to herselfOn her lips. And once she went to break a boughOf black alder.She strayed so far she scarcely heardWhen he called her—- And didn't answer—-didn't speak—-Or return.She stood, and then she ran and hidIn the fern. He never found her, though he lookedEverywhere,And he asked at her mother's houseWas she there. Sudden and swift and light as thatThe ties gave,And he learned of finalitiesBesides the grave. "OUT, OUT----" The buzz-saw snarled and rattled in the yardAnd made dust and dropped stove-length sticks ofwood,Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it.And from there those that lifted eyes could countFive mountain ranges one behind the otherUnder 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 saidTo please the boy by giving him the half hourThat a boy counts so much when saved from work.His sister stood beside them in her apronTo tell them "Supper." At the word, the saw,As if to prove saws knew 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!The boy's first outcry was a rueful laugh.As he swung toward them holding up the handHalf in appeal, but half as if to keepThe life from spilling. Then the boy saw all—-Since he was old enough to know, big boyDoing a man's work, though a child at heart—-He saw all spoiled. "Don't let him cut my hand off—-The doctor, when he comes. Don't let him, sister!"So. But 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 fright.No one believed. They listened at his heart.Little—-less—-nothing!—-and that ended it.No more to build on there. And they, since theyWere not the one dead, turned to their affairs.
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