Content Warning: This section of the guide features references to racially-motivated violence and murder, specifically lynching.

Stanza 1 (Lines 1-3)

The first three lines of the poem act as a prelude to what follows. The speaker is on the brink of discovering something startling, perhaps shocking, without yet giving any clue as to what it might be. The poem starts in a pleasant manner, with the speaker taking a walk in the woods on a sunny morning. However, this will turn out to be no normal walk. Whatever he is about to uncover happens quite by accident; he “stumbled suddenly” and comes “upon the thing” (Line 1). This strikes an ominous note—the threat of what the thing could be is amplified by the word “guarded” (Line 2) to refer to the trees that surround the grass clearing in the woods. As the reader questions what is being “guarded” (Line 2), the poem builds toward something great unfolding, and the reader’s unease about it is also stirred up by the phrase “sooty details” (Line 3).

Although it is a grave thing that he must relate, the speaker adopts a clever, storyteller’s introduction, or prelude, which grabs the reader’s attention and ensures that he or she reads on.