Poem by Robert Lee Frost

There Are Roughly Zones

We sit indoors and talk of the cold outside. 
And every gust that gathers strength and heaves 
Is a threat to the house. But the house has long been tried. 
We think of the tree. If it never again has leaves, 
We'll know, we say, that this was the night it died. 
It is very far north, we admit, to have brought the peach. 
What comes over a man, is it soul or mind 
That to no limits and bounds he can stay confined? 
You would say his ambition was to extend the reach 
Clear to the Arctic of every living kind. 
Why is his nature forever so hard to teach 
That though there is no fixed line between wrong and right, 
There are roughly zones whose laws must be obeyed. 
There is nothing much we can do for the tree tonight. 
But we can't help feeling more than a little betrayed 
That the northwest wind should rise to such a height
Just when the cold went down so many below. 
The tree has no leaves and may never have them again. 
We must wait till some months hence in the spring to know. 
But if it is destined never again to grow, 
It can blame this limitless trait in the hearts of men.

1. The Strong Are Saying Nothing
2. Unharvested
3. On a Bird Singing in Its Sleep
4. I Could Give All to Time
5. Carpe Diem

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