Section VI (lines 20-22) Summary

Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.

Lines 20-22

We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:

  • As the speaker and his neighbor walk the length of their wall, their hands get sore from handling all of the rocks.
  • The speaker likens the whole process to a game, like volleyball maybe. The wall is like a net, and the speaker and his neighbor are the two opposing teams.
  • The speaker says that such a ritual "comes to little more." Mending the wall is just a game to him. There’s no deeper purpose.