• Carl Sandburg Home Spring

    Carl Sandburg Home

    National Historic Site North Carolina

Seasonal Poetry

Fog
The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

Under the Harvest Moon
Under the harvest moon
When the soft sliver
Drips shimmering
Over the garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.

Follies
 
Shaken,
The blossoms of lilac,
  And shattered,
The atoms of purple.
Green dip the leaves,
  Darker the bark,
Longer the shadows.

Sheer lines of poplar
Shimmer with masses of silver
And down in a garden old with years
And broken walls of ruin and story,
Roses rise with red rain-memories.
  May!
  In the open world
The sun comes and finds your face,
  Remembering all.

Theme in Yellow
I spot the hills
With yellow balls in autumn.
I light the prairie cornfields
Orange and tawny gold clusters
On the last of October
When dusk is fallen
Children join hands
And circle round me
Singing ghost songs
And love to the harvest moon; I am jack-o’-lantern
With terrible teeth
And the children know
I am fooling.

Did You Know?

a black and white sketch of letters found on Carl Sandburg's desk; art by Will Irvine and Mark Haines

Everyday Carl Sandburg received mounds of letters from schools, organizations, beginning writers, media sponsors, critics, acquaintences, friends and family. Mr. Sandburg was very deliberate about to whom he wrote back, even keeping a carbon copy.