Splinter

Splinter - context Summary

Published in Smoke and Steel

Published in Carl Sandburg’s 1920 collection Smoke and Steel, "Splinter" is a very short lyric that compresses an autumnal farewell into a single image. The last cricket’s thin song across the first frost stands for a delicate, minimal parting. The poem’s brevity and tactile metaphor give a quiet, elegiac tone that fits the collection’s attention to everyday voices and fleeting moments.