Good Fences

"He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors'.
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
Where there are cows?
But here there are no cows.
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.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That wants it down.'"  - Robert Frost's "The Mending Wall"


I find boundaries difficult.  Here there are no cows.  What am I walling in or walling out?

I want to be close to people.  I long to connect.  I used to think that the only way to do that was not to build a wall.

Maybe you wanted a wall between us, cows or no.  I could not imagine what your reason could possibly be. 

As far as I was concerned, there was no good reason.  So I was like to give offence.  I'd get too close.  In your space.

If you had a wall, I'd try to tear it down, stone by stone, board by board, so I could get in.  Even if you didn't want me in.  Something there is that doesn't love a wall,/That wants it down.  I wanted it down, no matter the cost.

And cost it did.  Never mind your feelings.  Never mind mine.  What's the difference?

Isaiah chapter five begins:

"Let me sing for my beloved my love-song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill.²He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; he expected it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.³And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard.⁴What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it? When I expected it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?⁵And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. ⁶I will make it a waste..." (vv 1-6a)

"I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down."  The Lord surrounded his beloved vineyard with a wall.  To protect it.  Without the wall, the vineyard was defenseless.  It became a waste.

That's what happens to me -- and to you -- when we don't have walls.  One of us gets trampled.  My feelings or yours.  Your needs or mine.  My body or yours.