By Robert Frost (1913)
When I go up through the mowing field,
The headless aftermath,
Smooth-laid like thatch with the heavy dew,
Half closes the garden path.
And when I come to the garden ground,
The whir of sober birds
Up from the tangle of withered weeds
Is sadder than any words.
A tree beside the wall stands bare,
But a leaf that lingered brown,
Disturbed, I doubt not, by my thought,
Comes softly rattling down.
I end not far from my going forth
By picking the faded blue
Of the last remaining aster flower
To carry again to you.
Analysis
“A Late Walk” unfolds as a small elegy for autumn’s passing. The speaker crosses a dew-drenched field and a weed-choked garden, noticing each remnant of the season: the sober birds, the bare tree, the single brown leaf that falls at his thought. The final act—picking the last blue aster to bring “again to you”—binds observation and affection. Frost’s plain diction and steady rhythm turn sentiment into ritual.
The poem compresses an entire season into four quatrains of tenderness. Its imagery of fading color and sound renders time itself as something fragile and offered. “A Late Walk” captures Frost’s gift for closing the distance between nature and emotion: the external landscape mirrors inward feeling, yet never collapses into it. It is farewell without despair, an art of gentle leave-taking.