Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A BOY'S TENT, by MALLEVILLE HALLER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A BOY'S TENT, by                    
First Line: Slowly and steadily, yellow, red, brown
Last Line: Given safe summer shelter to a little bronzed lad?
Subject(s): Boys; Tents


Slowly and steadily, yellow, red, brown,
In the clear autumn sunlight, the leaves clicked down,
Circled and drifted, yellow, brown, red,
And clicked against the canvas that had sheltered his bed.

Day followed day and autumn drifted past.
In the early winter storms the tent held fast.
Snow swirled over and snow silted in
Across the board floor where his bare feet had been.

Bleached by the sun and rotted by the rain,
Fifty times frozen and thawed again,
Taut in the rain and slackened in the sun,
The guy ropes parted, one after one.

One wild winter night, with a great roaring rent,
The wind burst the roof. The whole thing went
Over in the snow. Would you know it for a tent,
This wreck of rope and canvas that the spring sun lifts
From the soiled shrinking snow of rotten March drifts?

Could you believe that this gray heap had
Given safe summer shelter to a little bronzed lad?





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