A Girl's Garden
by Robert Frost
A neighbor of mine in the village Likes to tell how one spring When she was a girl on the farm, she did A childlike thing. One day she asked her father To give her a garden plot To plant and tend and reap herself, And he said, “Why not?” In casting about for a corner He thought of an idle bit Of walled-off ground where a shop had stood, And he said, “Just it.” And he said, “That ought to make you An ideal one-girl farm, And give you a chance to put some strength On your slim-jim arm.” It was not enough of a garden, Her father said, to plough; So she had to work it all by hand, But she don’t mind now. She wheeled the dung in the wheelbarrow Along a stretch of road; But she always ran away and left Her not-nice load. And hid from anyone passing. And then she begged the seed. She says she thinks she planted one Of all things but weed. A hill each of potatoes, Radishes, lettuce, peas, Tomatoes, beets, beans, pumpkins, corn, And even fruit trees And yes, she has long mistrusted That a cider apple tree In bearing there to-day is hers, Or at least may be. Her crop was a miscellany When all was said and done, A little bit of everything, A great deal of none. Now when she sees in the village How village things go, Just when it seems to come in right, She says, “I know! It’s as when I was a farmer——” Oh, never by way of advice! And she never sins by telling the tale To the same person twice.
© Dave MacKen
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