Time & Brevity

Recalled

by Edwin Arlington Robinson 1869–1935

From Avon's Harvest (1921)

Time & Brevity

Long after there were none of them alive
About the place--where there is now no place
But a walled hole where fruitless vines embrace
Their parent skeletons that yet survive
In evil thorns--none of us could arrive
At a more cogent answer to their ways
Than one old Isaac in his latter days
Had humor or compassion to contrive.

I mentioned them, and Isaac shook his head:
"The Power that you call yours and I call mine
Extinguished in the last of them a line
That Satan would have disinherited.
When we are done with all but the Divine,
We die." And there was no more to be said.

MLA

Robinson, Edwin Arlington. “Recalled.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/robinson_ea/168/.

Chicago

Robinson, Edwin Arlington. “Recalled.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/robinson_ea/168/.

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