The poet of Fort Juniper

 I’m a Robert Francis fan, which is hard to explain.

Robert Frost, a fellow New Englander, called Francis the country’s best neglected poet. To me, Francis is the voice of finding enough: finding what’s essential for you and being content with that.

Francis had a master’s degree from Harvard and should have been set for a career as a teacher, the life he imagined for himself. But Francis found he wasn’t all that good at it, and so he built a small place where he could live frugally.

The house was 20-by-22 feet. It sat on half an acre and cost $1,500. It was just big enough for him — physically, socially and economically. He named it Fort Juniper after the evergreen that the farmers around Amherst, Mass., considered a pest.

He said it was an expression of his way of life. When Francis was asked how much space a person needed, he replied: Not more than you can get clean. He wanted to write, rather than clean house or work at a job he didn’t like so he could afford a better house and a housekeeper.

I find that aesthetic in his poetry: simple and direct, not fancy.

• Source: Robert Francis, The Trouble with Francis, University of Massachusetts Press, 1971.