Paul's Wife Poem Rhyme Scheme

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to say to him	A
'How is the wife Paul ' and he'd disappear	B
Some said it was because be bad no wife	C
And hated to be twitted on the subject	D
Others because he'd come within a day	E
Or so of having one and then been Jilted	F
Others because he'd had one once a good one	G
Who'd run away with someone else and left him	A
And others still because he had one now	H
He only had to be reminded of	I
He was all duty to her in a minute	J
He had to run right off to look her up	K
As if to say 'That's so how is my wife	C
I hope she isn't getting into mischief '	L
No one was anxious to get rid of Paul	M
He'd been the hero of the mountain camps	N
Ever since just to show them he bad slipped	O
The bark of a whole tamarack off whole	P
As clean as boys do off a willow twig	Q
To make a willow whistle on a Sunday	E
April by subsiding meadow brooks	R
They seemed to ask him just to see him go	S
'How is the wife Paul ' and he always went	T
He never stopped to murder anyone	G
Who asked the question He just disappeared	U
Nobody knew in what direction	G
Although it wasn't usually long	V
Before they beard of him in some new camp	W
The same Paul at the same old feats of logging	X
The question everywhere was why should Paul	M
Object to being asked a civil question	G
A man you could say almost anything to	Y
Short of a fighting word You have the answers	Z
And there was one more not so fair to Paul	M
That Paul had married a wife not his equal	A2
Paul was ashamed of her To match a hero	S
She would have had to be a heroine	G
Instead of which she was some half breed squaw	X
But if the story Murphy told was true	Y
She wasn't anything to be ashamed of	I
	-
You know Paul could do wonders Everyone's	B2
Heard how he thrashed the horses on a load	C2
That wouldn't budge until they simply stretched	D2
Their rawhide harness from the load to camp	W
Paul told the boss the load would be all right	E2
'The sun will bring your load in' and it did	F
By shrinking the rawhide to natural length	F2
That's what is called a stretcher But I guess	G2
The one about his jumping so's to land	H2
With both his feet at once against the ceiling	X
And then land safely right side up again	I2
Back on the floor is fact or pretty near fact	J2
Well this is such a yarn Paul sawed his wife	C
Out of a white pine log Murphy was there	K2
And as you might say saw the lady born	L2
Paul worked at anything in lumbering	X
He'd been bard at it taking boards away	E
For I forget the last ambitious sawyer	M2
To want to find out if he couldn't pile	N2
The lumber on Paul till Paul begged for mercy	O2
They'd sliced the first slab off a big butt log	X
And the sawyer had slammed the carriage back	X
To slam end on again against the saw teeth	P2
To judge them by the way they caught themselves	Q2
When they saw what had happened to the log	X
They must have had a guilty expectation	G
Something was going to go with their slambanging	X
Something bad left a broad black streak of grease	R2
On the new wood the whole length of the log	X
Except perhaps a foot at either end	S2
But when Paul put his finger in the grease	R2
It wasn't grease at all but a long slot	T2
The log was hollow They were sawing pine	U2
'First time I ever saw a hollow pine	U2
That comes of having Paul around the place	V2
Take it to bell for me ' the sawyer said	W2
Everyone had to have a look at it	X2
And tell Paul what he ought to do about it	X2
They treated it as his 'You take a jackknife	C
And spread the opening and you've got a dugout	Y2
All dug to go a fishing in ' To Paul	M
The hollow looked too sound and clean and empty	O2
Ever to have housed birds or beasts or bees	Z2
There was no entrance for them to get in by	A3
It looked to him like some new kind of hollow	S
He thought he'd better take his jackknife to	Y
So after work that evening be came back	X
And let enough light into it by cutting	X
To see if it was empty He made out in there	K2
A slender length of pith or was it pith	B3
It might have been the skin a snake had cast	C3
And left stood up on end inside the tree	O2
The hundred years the tree must have been growing	X
More cutting and he bad this in both hands	D3
And looking from it to the pond nearby	A3
Paul wondered how it would respond to water	M2
Not a breeze stirred but just the breath of air	K2
He made in walking slowly to the beach	E3
Blew it once off his hands and almost broke it	X2
He laid it at the edge where it could drink	X
At the first drink it rustled and grew limp	F3
At the next drink it grew invisible	A2
Paul dragged the shallows for it with his fingers	Z
And thought it must have melted It was gone	G3
And then beyond the open water dim with midges	H3
Where the log drive lay pressed against the boom	I3
It slowly rose a person rose a girl	J3
Her wet hair heavy on her like a helmet	J
Who leaning on a log looked back at Paul	M
And that made Paul in turn look back	X
To see if it was anyone behind him	A
That she was looking at instead of him	A
Murphy had been there watching all the time	K3
But from a shed where neither of them could see him	A
There was a moment of suspense in birth	L3
When the girl seemed too waterlogged to live	C
Before she caught her first breath with a gasp	M3
And laughed Then she climbed slowly to her feet	N3
And walked off talking to herself or Paul	M
Across the logs like backs of alligators	Z
Paul taking after her around the pond	O3
	-
Next evening Murphy and some other fellows	P3
Got drunk and tracked the pair up Catamount	Q3
From the bare top of which there is a view	Y
TO other hills across a kettle valley	O2
And there well after dark let Murphy tell it	X2
They saw Paul and his creature keeping house	R3
It was the only glimpse that anyone	G
Has had of Paul and her since Murphy saw them	S3
Falling in love across the twilight millpond	X2
More than a mile across the wilderness	T3
They sat together halfway up a cliff	C
In a small niche let into it the girl	J3
Brightly as if a star played on the place	V2
Paul darkly like her shadow All the light	X2
Was from the girl herself though not from a star	U3
As was apparent from what happened next	X2
All those great ruffians put their throats together	M2
And let out a loud yell and threw a bottle	A2
As a brute tribute of respect to beauty	X2
Of course the bottle fell short by a mile	N2
But the shout reached the girl and put her light out	X2
She went out like a firefly and that was all	M
	-
So there were witnesses that Paul was married	X2
And not to anyone to be ashamed of	C
Everyone had been wrong in judging Paul	M
Murphy told me Paul put on all those airs	V3
About his wife to keep her to himself	C
Paul was what's called a terrible possessor	M2
Owning a wife with him meant owning her	M2
She wasn't anybody else's business	T3
Either to praise her or much as name her	M2
And he'd thank people not to think of her	M2
Murphy's idea was that a man like Paul	M
Wouldn't be spoken to about a wife	C
In any way the world knew how to speak	X

Robert Frost

Paul's Wife Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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