Poetry Slam!: "Mending Wall," by Robert Frost

Written in unrhymed iambic pentameter, or blank verse, this poem describes a pair of farmers working together to fix the stone wall separating their estates. Read the text here.

Here are links to our lists for other poems by Robert Frost: "The Death of the Hired Man", "After Apple-Picking", "Out, Out—", "Birches"
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. swell
    a rounded elevation (especially one on an ocean floor)
    Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
    That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
    And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
    And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
  2. boulder
    a large smooth mass of rock detached from a place of origin
    Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
    That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
    And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
    And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
  3. abreast
    alongside each other, facing in the same direction
    Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
    That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
    And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
    And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
  4. repair
    the act of putting something in working order again
    I have come after them and made repair
  5. yelp
    a sharp high-pitched cry
    But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
    To please the yelping dogs.
  6. gap
    an open or empty space in or between things
    The gaps I mean,
    No one has seen them made or heard them made,
    But at spring mending-time we find them there.
  7. mend
    restore by putting together what is torn or broken
    The gaps I mean,
    No one has seen them made or heard them made,
    But at spring mending-time we find them there.
  8. loaf
    a shaped mass of baked bread
    And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
    We have to use a spell to make them balance:
  9. balance
    be in equilibrium
    And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
    We have to use a spell to make them balance:
  10. orchard
    a small cultivated area where fruit trees are planted
    He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
  11. mischief
    reckless or malicious behavior causing annoyance in others
    Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
    If I could put a notion in his head:
  12. notion
    an odd or fanciful or capricious idea
    Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
    If I could put a notion in his head:
  13. offense
    a feeling of anger caused by being offended
    Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
    What I was walling in or walling out,
    And to whom I was like to give offence.
  14. grasp
    hold firmly
    I see him there
    Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
    In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
  15. savage
    a member of an uncivilized people
    I see him there
    Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
    In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
Created on Tue Apr 09 15:44:05 EDT 2013 (updated Tue Nov 28 13:55:07 EST 2017)

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