SYMBOLIC OVERTONE IN ROBERT FROST’S POETRY || Thesis paper || Research paper

Robert Frost was a very famous poet. He left an imprint in this world by creating mind blowing poems that let readers experience deep emotions through words.  

Robert Frost usually focuses his poems on a person’s everyday experiences, but he also adds many metaphors that relate to his everyday experiences, weather, seasons and nature in general. In many of Frost’s poems he expresses his emotions by using symbolism.

Symbols are words that stand for or denote something else, not by exact resemblance, but by vague suggestion. So, symbolic poetry is evocative rather than descriptive. Symbolism is the practice of representing things by symbols. A symbolic poet does not convey his meaning by direct statement; he uses words with symbolic mean­ing to convey his ideas. Even the symbolic poems have surface meanings but rich symbols add deeper meanings to words. Again, Symbols are essentially words which are not merely connotative, but also evocative and emotive. In addition to their meaning, they also call up or evoke before the mind's eye a host of associa­tions connected with them, and are also rich in emotional signi­ficance. For example, the word 'lily' merely connotes a 'flower' but it also evokes images of beauty and innocence. It also carries with it the emotional overtone of pity resulting from suffering or oppres­sion. In this way, through symbols a writer can express much more than by the use of ordinary words; symbols make the language rich and expressive. Concepts which by their very nature are inexpressible can be conveyed in this way. Thus a symbol can be used to convey, "Pure sensations", or the poet's apprehension of transcendental, mystery.

Many of Robert Frost's poems are simple and plain, but there are poems that are rich in symbolic content and have symbolic overtones. Frost wanted to be known as a symbolic poet as is evident from his following statement:

"I am, by intention, a symbolic who takes his symbols from the public domain."

Frost enriches his poems through symbols which add deeper meaning to particular situations, events and happenings. W.B. Yeats was a truly symbolist poet who drew his inspiration from the French symbolists. But Robert Frost is not a symbolic poet of the order of Yeats. Still he is in the line of Yeats and hence a truly modern poet, although many critics deny him the title of a modern poet and dub him as a conventional poet.

Robert Frost was a regional poet who drew his inspiration and material from New England region of America—to be exact, the area which lies north of Boston. The people of his poetry are the people of New England, their language the language of New England people. His themes also have a bearing on New England situation, its people, its weather, its hardships, and its beliefs. Frost celebrated New Eng­land in poem after poem. The New England region becomes a microcosm of the world at large, and the Yankee characters become symbols of human nature everywhere and in all ages.

Take for example the poem "Mending Wall."   The surface meaning of the   poem is well   expressed by the   line:

 "Good fences make good neighbors." ("Mending Wall"; L-45)  

But the poem becomes more signi­ficant when taken on a symbolic level. Speaking about the symbolism of this poem Lynen observes, : "The poem seems merely descriptive and anecdotal in character, yet everyone who has read it will remem­ber a certain feeling of puzzlement, a sense that Frost is driving at some point which one is not quite able to grasp. We are told how the speaker in the poem and his neighbor get together every spring to repair the stone wall between their properties.   The neighbor, a. crusty New England farmer, seems to have a deep-seated faith in the value of walls.    He declines to explain his belief and will only reiterate his father's saying, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.' The speaker is of the opposite opinion.

   As he points out:

There where it is we do not need the wall;

He is all pine and I am apple orchard. ("Mending Wall"; L-23, 24)

To him the neighbor’s adherence to his father's saying suggests the narrowness and blind habit of the primitive:

He moves in darkness as it seems. To me,

‘Not of woods only and the shade of trees. ("Mending Wall"; L- 41, 42) 

Yet the speaker's own attitude is also enigmatic and in some respects primitive. He seems to be in sympathy with some elemental spirit in nature which denies all boundaries:

Sometime there is that doesn't love a wall

That sends the frozen ground-swell under it

And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

And makes gaps even two can pass abreast......

No one has seen them made or heard them made,

But at spring mending-time we find them there......

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,

That wants it down.   I could say 'Elves' to him,

But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather

He said it for himself. (“Mending Wall”)

The poem portrays a clash between these two points of view, and it may therefore seem that its meaning is the solution Frost offers to the disagreement. The poem leads one to ask, which is right, the speaker or his Yankee neighbor? Should man tear down the barriers which isolate individuals from one another, or should he recognize that distinctions and limits are necessary to human life? Frost does not really provide an answer, and the attempt to wrest one from his casual details and enigmatic comments would falsify his meaning. It is not Frost's purpose to convey a message or give us a pat lesson in human relations. Though the poem presents the speaker's attitude more sympathetically than the neighbor’s, it does not offer this as the total meaning. Frost's intent is to portray a problem and explore the many different and paradoxical issues it involves. He pictures it within the incidents from rural life, and in order to reveal its com­plex nature he develops it through the conflict of two opposed points of view. The clash between the speaker and his neighbor lays bare the issue, which within their world is the simple matter of whether or not it is worthwhile to maintain the unnecessary wall in defiance of nature's persistent attempt to tear it down. But one cannot avoid looking at this problem in other contexts of experience. The wall becomes the symbol of all kinds of man-made barriers. The two views of it represent general attitudes towards life—the one, a surren­der to the natural forces which draw human beings together, the other, the conservatism which persists in keeping up distinctions separating them. Thus the poem represents the clash between the spirit of revolt and the spirit of restraint. The first challenges tradi­tion, while the latter adheres to the tradition.

From the above it becomes apparent that the poem "Mending Wall" yields an interpretation which is wider and deeper in scope than its surface meaning. On a superficial level one can find only one meaning but on a deeper reading the poem unfolds new vistas of meaning till now unthought-of. The wall is the shining star of this poem. It unites our speaker and his neighbor, but separates them as well. As we hear the neighbors speak the proverb twice. We start to consider all of the wall-like structures in our life: fences, gates, boundaries, lines, etc. The wall serves as a canvas upon which a lot of complex ideas about the ways in which people, and their relationships with others, are painted and discussed.

Again, Nature seems to act as the third wheel in this poem – the silent character swirling around the speaker and his neighbor. Although he doesn’t explicitly describe the landscape, we see it very clearly, and we seem to know what the seasons are like in this part of the world. Similarly, tradition seems to be the silent subject over which the speaker and his neighbor wrestle. The neighbor upholds his ancestors’ way of life, while our speaker questions this philosophy.

The poem “Fire and Ice” is another symbolic poem of Robert Frost. This short epigrammatic poem was first published by Frost in the December 1920 issue of Harper’s Magazine. It was later collected by him in New Hampshire, a collection of his verse. In the poem the poet speculates about the end of the world. Some say that the world will end in fire, other maintain that it will come to and end in ice. The poem describes a fictional debate between people who say that the world will end in fire and people who say it will end in ice. It is a highly symbolic debate.

The poet says-

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice. (“Fire and Ice”; L, 1-2)

Lines 1 and 2: These two lines have a parallel structure, beginning with "Some say." This phrase is an example of alliteration. Fire and ice, as we mentioned above, are symbols. Specifically, they represent emotions like "desire" and "hate." But be careful – there's no reason to think that these are all that fire and ice represent. Desire and hate are merely examples that fall in a broader category.

The poem revolves around the two symbols of fire and ice. In the first two lines, we don't yet know that they are symbols. Judging by these lines alone, this could be a poem about theories of modern science. But when the speaker associates fire with desire and ice with hate, we know that fire and ice are symbols for human behaviors and emotions. But the poem does not close down possibilities for your imagination to run wild by telling us exactly what these two basic forces represent. You should feel free to relate them to your own thoughts and experiences and come up with an interpretation.

The poem itself does not require a large amount of explanation as to meaning of words or phrases, due to Frost’s concentration on making the poem readable and understandable by all. Despite the simplicity of the language use, the poem carries with it very deep thematic ideas. Essentially, Frost is providing commentary upon two of the darkest traits of humanity: the capacity to hate, and the capacity to be consumed by lust. Of the two, he attributes the greater of two evils to desire, saying

“From what I’ve tasted of desire 

I hold with those who favor fire.” (“Fire and Ice”; L, 3-4)

In giving desire the foremost position in regards to the destruction of the world, Frost is providing a powerful statement on the subject of greed and jealousy, saying that above all else, even hatred, this is the trait of humanity that is most likely to lead to its demise. To Frost, desire represents the greatest problem that the world faces. In light of the fact that this was written in regards to the Great War, this statement is essentially attributing the cause of the war to human greed and lust, in doing so providing a current and relatable warning against this behavior in the future. Following his statement upon fire and desire, Frost then attributes hatred with almost the same capacity to do harm as desire, saying

 “I think I know enough of hate

to say that for destruction ice…would suffice.”

Is also great
And would suffice. (“Fire and Ice”; L, 6-9)

 While this lessens the relative importance of hatred in regards to the poem as a whole, it is still presented as having the ability to lead to the destruction of the world if it were to happen for a second time, again providing a powerful warning against this human fallacy. Overall, then, the intention and meaning behind the poem is a basic desire on Frost’s part to warn, in his own manner, against what he sees as the two greatest problems facing humanity.

Symbolism is the key to this poem. Frost very explicitly makes fire a symbol for desire, and ice a symbol for hate. This, coupled with the imagery that these symbols evoke, creates a multidimensional complexity to the poem. Because of the deeper meaning that fire and ice take on, the application and understanding of the poem is altered. While the poem still is interpreted as a warning against these behaviors in the broad scheme of the world, in concordance with the war that was occurring, it also begins to take on a more personal level. Namely, this is due to the personal connection that is shared by the creation of these symbols, with fire and desire, ice and hate. The poem is then applied to one’s everyday life, and is interpreted as a warning against vices of desire and hatred in day to day life, not just in the larger world. Therefore, by making fire and ice a symbol, and forcing the reader to consider their application to the poem and it’s broader warning, this warning is then applied to the reader’s own life, increasing the effectiveness and impact of the poem.

"Fire and Ice" bears many of the characteristics that represent the body of work for Robert Frost. It is written in a simple manner, using a language set and vernacular that is designed to be easily understood. As is also a trend with Frost in his poetry, the subject matter of the poem deals deeply with human nature, exploring the implicit human emotions of desire and hatred. This subject matter, too, has a large capacity to be relatable to the audience, as it shares in collective human experience, in feelings that are experienced by all. Also in concurrence to the habits of Frost, these darker, deeper themes are presented in contrast to the simplicity and openness of the actual language of the poem, done intentionally to highlight the underlying theme. As a poem, this work also represents a significant break from the larger body of work of Robert Frost. While many of his poems are regionalist in nature, dealing with common aspects of life of New England, this poem does not exhibit the heavily regionalist nature, instead exhibiting a complete lack of it. This too is done to provide a point of contrast. By placing this poem outside of the ‘norm” for himself, Frost is able to effectively draw attention to this poem, lending a deeper level of significance to the poem and its warning. The regionalism of Frost's work, as well as the break from it that is represented by "Fire and Ice" can be seen in two of Frost's most famous poems “The Road Not Taken” and “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”

As it can be seen, these works have a heavy focus upon the New England setting, a trait that, as aforementioned is not seen in "Fire and Ice." These two poems do share elements with "Fire and Ice," namely in the pattern of presenting deep, important themes under the guise of simple, understated words. This creates this previously mentioned accessibility to all audiences, while giving the poetry significant literary merit.

Robert Frost poems are singular for their deceptive simplicity. The poem "The Road Not Taken" is also rich in symbolic meaning. It also is a pretty poem about nature, but with much deeper symbolic meaning.  On the surface level the poem is about a man who finds himself on a crossing and cannot decide which road to take. Ultima­tely he decides to move on the road that was less frequented. On the symbolic level the poem can represent the predicament of the poet when faced with two lines of poetic development. The poet, like the man, finally, must choose the less frequented road only because in this his chance to fame lies. The choice is all important for the poet and he says, it made all the difference. The destination of the poet is determined by the spirit behind the man.

“The Road Not Taken” One of his most well known poems, it strikes a chord with any who read it. The symbolism featured within has been the subject of a wide variety of interpretations; however, most insist that this poem symbolizes the incessant curiosity that resides within human nature. Whichever choice is taken in life, one will always wonder what possibilities the other choice may have held.

Many interpretations have been made of this poem, but Frost himself claimed the inspiration came from his dear friend Edward Thomas, a welsh poet whom he’d met in England. It was said that Thomas was never content with the choices he made, and whenever walking with Frost in England, would always regret path they had chosen. Frost had even said to Thomas, “No matter which road you take, you’ll always sigh, and wish you’d taken another”. The poem is a gentle teasing of not only his friend’s constant regret and curiosity, but also that of human behavior. The subtle humor found at the end of Frost’s poem gently pokes fun of humanity’s unsatisfied and curious nature on one level, but also sheds light upon the finalities of choice, and the lost opportunities that go with them.

Within the four stanzas of “The Road Not Taken” the speaker narrates coming across two roads while walking through the woods one autumn morning. The symbolic value of the forking roads is fairly easy to grasp, representing the choices that one comes across throughout the journey of life. Regretful that he can choose only one, the speaker is careful in his choice of road,

“And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;” (“The Road Not Taken” lines 3-5).

 This is where much of the debate on theme and symbolism begins. For instance, an article written by William Pritchard, claims that the speaker’s choice between the roads was a matter of impulse, and not one of careful decision, because of the emphasis he put on the similarities between the roads .

Three times within the first three stanzas, the speaker mentions how the roads are virtually the same. First by describing the roads

“Then took the other as just as fair” (“The Road Not Taken”; line 6),

Then with

“Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same” (“The Road Not Taken”; lines 9-10),

And finishing with lines eleven and twelve, saying

 “And both that morning equally lay

                  In leaves no step had trodden black.”(“The Road Not Taken”; lines 11-12)

 Many claim that he contradicts himself here, and attempts to deceive himself as well as his audience by claiming the path he took was “grassy and wanted wear” the poet says:

                Because it was grassy and wanted wear; (“The Road Not Taken” line -8).

That instead, there was no road less traveled by, and in saying so the speaker is really just attempting to glorify his impulsive choice.

However, it may be more appropriate to see the speaker in a different light. He is not lying about the roads, but rather, he studies them long enough until he can find any difference between them. After all, he is faced with a choice, and cannot continue until he chooses, so it is not unreasonable to think that he would take as much consideration as possible in making his decision.

When evaluating the symbolism side by side with the theme here, one can see that instead of just being roads passing through a wood, they are instead roads that lead down different paths in life. And so the caution exhibited by the speaker would be expected. Though initially the paths seem to be the same, upon closer inspection one can see the differences that would result in different outcomes in life. The speaker does admit in line seven that the road holds only

 “And having perhaps the better claim,” (“The Road Not Taken”; line- 7)

Because the differences between them are so few, it is difficult for the speaker to be completely sure in his decision.

The roads symbolism is seen throughout the theme of the entire poem, and sheds light upon the nature of human thought and indecision. The poem is an example of the “difficult but necessary process of making choices in life” the poet says

Then took the other, as just as fair, (“The Road Not Taken”;line 6)

 It is difficult to make a choice that will affect the outcome of one’s life, and human nature lends to curiosity. What could have been? What opportunities were gained, and what opportunities were lost by the choice made?

Unsatisfied with the unknown, the speaker tries to convince himself that he will have the opportunity to someday return and experience the other path. Life, however, does not work this way, and the speaker knows this.

“Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back” (“The Road Not Taken”; lines 14-15).

 Even if the reader were able to return and travel the other road, the circumstances would never again be the same they were at that moment, on that particular day. As Jennifer Bouchard says in her article, “Because one cannot go down two roads at once, there is no way to be certain where different choices would have led”

The last stanza in Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” is perhaps the most important regarding the theme and symbolism found within the poem. When studying the lines below, one can see how many different interpretations have been made regarding the entire poem from this last stanza.

“I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two Roads diverged in a wood, and I--

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.”(“The Road Not Taken”; Lines 16-20)

In line sixteen, the first line of the last stanza, Frost’s choice of the word “sigh” leads some to believe that his future become of the road he ultimately took, is a grim one. That he is regretful because his outcome in life is unhappy, and it can be traced back to that day in the woods. An interpretive article written by Terry Andrews implies the choice “has made all the difference” allowing that the “difference” was for the worse.

However, rather than regarding the “sigh” as a purely negative word, it could just as easily been seen as a sigh of relief, or perhaps a sigh of resignation, with each choice one makes, the circumstances of the other is lost, and therefore it is impossible to know what could have been . It seems to be the speaker’s “sigh” resonates with the latter. His human curiosity burns within him, regardless of which choice was made, he would still want to know what possibilities in life he passed by.

The fact that one choice made between two roads which initially seemed so equal, can actually make “all the difference,” symbolizes the power of possibilities and circumstance in life. “Way,” does indeed “lead on to way,” and there is no turning back. A path in life that seems to be the same as another contains subtle differences that lead to different outcomes. It is the nature of humanity, with its innate curiosity, and regretful demeanor that makes it difficult for a person to be completely content with the road he chooses to take in life. Regardless of the opportunities he gained along his way, the simple fact that he will never know what could have been, that he will never know what he may have missed in his journey of life, will leave him always wondering of “The Road Not Taken.”

Robert frost is known as the Nature poet, modern poet, and a Lyric poet. We find natural element in his poetry He is also known as Regional poet. John F. Lynen Says that Frost has so man and such excellent poems about natural scenery and wild life, “that one can hardly avoid thinking of him as a natural poet”.  We can find some element of Modernity like his Pastoral Technique, Attitude towards Nature-Realism and Metaphysical technique. We find symbolism in his poetry like natural symbol in the poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening".

The poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" is also rich in symbolic overtones. The theme of the poem is simple enough: it is the description of .a scene of the woods and the circumstances under which the narrator has stopped there. But behind this seeming simplicity there runs a meaning which is far-reaching in its effects. Although this moving personal experience has been exquisitely ren­dered, yet in reconsidering it one cannot quite shake off the feeling that something more is intended that is apparent on the superficial level. Lynen says, "The poem is not just a record of something that once happened to the poet; it points outward from the moment described toward far broader areas of experience. It expresses the conflict which everyone has felt, between the demands of practical life, with its obligations to others, and the poignant desire to escape into a land of reverie, where consciousness is dimmed and the senses are made independent of necessity."The woods which the poet admires so per­fectly are opposed to the promises that the poet has to keep.” Further, the poet tells us about his intention of sleeping only when he has kept his promises, when sleep becomes a reward of a well-earned toil. It was this symbolism of the poem which so attracted our beloved Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, that he kept the last lines of the poem on his work table:

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep. ("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”; L, 13-16)

This poem is one of the most quietly moving of frost’s lyrics. The lyric is Simplicity itself. Poem starts with the question like,

   “Whose woods these are I think I know”. ("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”; L-1)

Here we find that our speaker is sound confuse, he is not confident about the owner of the woods. The speaker thinks that he knows the owner of the woods, and he lives in a house in the village and village is not the most hopping’ place in the world. And he feels calm because he knows that the owner of the wood is not present in the wood so he can move freely in it. Here snow is a kind of Temptation. The poem is about the continuity of time and life. Poet is talking about the idea of spiritual

         “He will not see me stopping here

      To watch his woods fill up with snow”("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening";L-3,4)

Here God is symbolizing as village and woods. The illusion of poet we can see here because as we know that good is everywhere though poet believes that the owner of the wood can’t see him. Here woods are symbolized as nature and the owner of the nature is god. “My little horse” is use for “the soul” and horse is a kind of a tool to rich your destination. There is something strange for the horse because our speaker stop his horse in the woods and near the farm house so horse could not find the reason of speaker’s stop at middle. Poet stops in between woods and a lake which is frozen with snow, because he was fascinated by the beauty of the woods and frozen lake. And between the woods and frozen lake symbolize the period of birth to death.

             “The darkest evening of the year”.("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening",L-8)

The darkest evening of the year mean by him is about the season of winter. And winter symbolizes the death. And the other meaning of it is that the one fourth parts of a day and a day means a life. Poet is saying that “Life is like a day” and the darkest evening is the worst time of the soul or may be for poet or an individuals. The darkest evening of the year is also symbolized as near to die or about to die. 

   “He gives his harness bells a shake”. ("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"; L-9)

Bell is a kind of guide here. And here the line suggests that a person who can predict the bad or worst situation before the things will happen by getting some signs. So here bell is use as symbol for make him aware about the place. And instead of bells ringing sound we find the sound of sweeping, and this comes from the slight wind and softly falling snow.

And the last four line of the last stanza has a very deep meaning.

    “The woods are lovely, dark and deep.”("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"; L-13)

Poet connects the word woods with life and the meaning of this line is that life is lovely as well as dark, it means full of risk and difficulty. And deep it means whatever happens with us throughout our life that is difficult to understand some times. So the complexity of life is symbolized with the word deep.

              “But I have promises to keep”("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening";L-14)

 The line suggests that whatever the life of an individual he or she has to live. Everyone has to accept the truth or reality of their life and try to live with it. And the last two lines are very important.

                   “And miles to go before I sleep.

                    And miles to go before I sleep.”("Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"; L-15,16)

The line suggest that Death is the ultimate reality of the life but before that an individual has some duty to fulfill and the words like “and miles to go” suggest the same thing that there are so many works and responsibility an individual has  and he has to complete before the end of his life. And “before I sleep” it symbolizes the death.         

After the above discursion we find these symbols in the poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"

Ø Woods:- Here woods are symbolizes as contrast to civilization. In line 1, 4, 7 and 13 some interpret the woods as an extended metaphor for death.

Ø The natural world:- In natural world  the snow is symbol of coolness and the frozen lake is symbol of the death and chillness of life means unable to help even the self also.

Ø Other symbols:- Here we find some symbol like Village, horse, sleep etc..

Ø Village:-  Village is symbolize here as Society and Civilization.

Ø Horse:-   Horse is  symbolize as soul.

Ø Sleep:-    Sleep is symbolize as Death.

Robert Frost writes the poem “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” in 1st person point of view has symbolic meanings hidden in it.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Yet another poem which is symbolically important is "Out, Out." Robert Frost’s “‘Out, Out—’” describes a farm accident that unexpectedly and irrationally costs a young boy his life. A young man is cutting firewood with a buzz saw in New England. Near the end of the day, the boy’s sister announces that it is time for dinner and, out of excitement, the boy accidentally cuts his hand with the saw. He begs his sister not to allow the doctor to amputate the hand but inwardly realizes that he has already lost too much blood to survive. The boy dies while under anesthesia, and everyone goes back to work. The narrator of the poem sets the scene, seemingly from an outsider’s perspective, reporting the incident with objectivity and restraint. Yet, as the narrative advances, underlying emotions and tensions surface as the persona builds to the poem’s conclusion: the seemingly senseless, abrupt ending of the boy’s life, followed by his family’s subsequent return to their daily routines.

This is the whole incident which is described in the poem but the pathos is so intense that we can say that this is the main theme of the poem. The mean­ing of the poem can be read through the key of the following lines:

 “So. But the hand was gone already": (“Out, Out”; L-27)

The boy's first outcry was a rueful laugh, As he swung toward them holding up the hand Half in appeal, but half as if to keep The life from spilling.   Then the boy saw all — Since he was old enough to know, big boy Doing a man's work, though a child at heart— He saw all spoiled.

 The poet says :

“The boy’s first outcry was a rueful laugh.”(Out,Out;L-18)

The pathos of the death of the boy can be understood only when we think about the results that may ensue after the hand has been lost— how the boy will have to become dependent on others, how his chef-respect will be hurt. As Lynen says: "The story symbolizes a tragic aspect as the human situation: the fact that man's economic means, for the very reason that they are mechanical in nature, can destroy him. The death may not always be a physical one, as in the boy's case, but a destruction of man's essential humanity."

In this poem, the title is taken from Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” in which Macbeth, hearing of his wife’s death, soliloquizes:

Out, Out, brief candle

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is heard no more. it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing. ( “Macbeth”)

Macbeth here speaks of the meaninglessness of life, it senselessness and its purposelessness. In frost’s poem, the violent death of the youth raises similar questions as the life’s value. the opening lines of the poem create a contrast between the pastoral quietness of the landscape and the noise of the saw whose snarling sounds make it seem like a wild animal. The sawing has proceeded routinely , nothing makes the day unique:

“And nothing happened: day was all but done.”(“Out ,Out”;  L-9)

As this point, the poet breaks in his own voice, remarking

Call it a day, I wish they might have said

To please the boy by giving him the half hour

That a boy counts so much when saved from work. (“Out,Out”;L-10,11,12)

Trough these words, the speaker emphasizes the youthful quality of the boy and, by so doing prepares the reader for a sense of the tragedy of one dying so young. In this poem Robert Frost deals tragedy by using symbol.

Robert Frost has written so many poems. Most of the poems he used symbols. At first I would like to discuss his first published work “My Butterfly”. This poem contains eight stanzas varying in length from four to ten lines .Frost in meter or verse expressing various emotions which are expressed by the use of variety of techniques including symbols, metaphors, similes and onomatopoeia. The emphasis on the aesthetics of language and the use of techniques such as repetition, meter and rhyme are what are commonly used to distinguish Robert Frost poetry from Robert Frost prose. Poems often make heavy use of imagery, symbols, and word association to quickly convey emotions. A famous example of Robert Frost poetry is the poem “My Butterfly”. Poetry written such as the poem “My Butterfly” is a piece of literature written by the American poet Robert Frost. Throughout the course of the poem, "My Butterfly" by Robert Frost, the author uses the theme of death and sorrowfulness; a feeling that is emitted during the loss of a loved one by using symbols.

Robert Frost's poem "My Butterfly" draws a parallel between a butterfly the narrator is mourning the death of and the author himself, focusing on the joyfulness he felt the summer he first saw the butterfly to the sorrow he feels after the butterfly's death. Frost's agnostic beliefs present themselves in the text.

"My Butterfly" tells the sorrow felt by the speaker over the death of a butterfly he had seen the previous summer. The butterfly which once inspired joy and magic in the speaker now leaves the speaker to question Fate and God as the forces which rule the cosmos.

In this poem we find a lot of symbols. “Butterfly” is a symbolical word. Generally butterfly means freedom but symbolically it is not free.

In the second stanza the poet says that-

The gray grass is not dappled with the snow;
Its two banks have not shut upon the river;
But it is long ago—
It seems forever—
Since first I saw thee glance,
With all the dazzling other ones,
In airy dalliance,
Precipitate in love,
Tossed, tangled, whirled and whirled above,
Like a limp rose-wreath in a fairy dance. ( “My Butterfly”L,8-17).

As the speaker says in the 8th stanza of the poem,

"I found that wing broken today

 For thou art dead, I said.

 And the strange birds say.

 I found it withered leaves

 Under the eaves.",( “My Butterfly”.L,43-47)

 The quote illustrates how the speak acknowledges the death of someone after the "wing is broken".

My Butterfly

North of Boston is frost’s “Book of people” and there are many abnormal and alienated people in it. One such is the “Over-wrought” mother in the Home Burial cracking up under a burden grief over the death of her first- born. It is the shadow of her dead child which brings her in conflict with her husband and alienates them. It is a dramatic dialogue in which the action is developed through the dialogue between husband and wife.  The couple is caught in a moment of spiritual crisis, and the expression of their emotion has all the intensity of the lyric.

                         The poem describes two tragedies: first, the death of a young child, and second, the death of a marriage. As such, the title “Home Burial,” can be read as a tragic double entendre. Although the death of the child is the catalyst of the couple’s problems, the larger conflict that destroys the marriage is the couple’s inability to communicate with one another. Both characters feel grief at the loss of the child, but neither is able to understand the way that their partner chooses to express their sorrow.

The setting of the poem–a staircase with a door at the bottom and a window at the top– automatically sets up the relationship between the characters. The wife stands at the top of the stairs, directly in front of the window overlooking the graveyard, while the husband stands at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at her. While the couple shares the tragedy of their child’s death, they are in conflicting positions in terms of dealing with their grief With her position closest to the window, the wife is clearly still struggling with her grief over the loss of her baby. Incapable of moving on at this point in her life, the wife defines her identity in terms of the loss and would rather grieve for the rest of her life than grieve as a sort of pretense. The husband has dealt with his sorrow more successfully, as evidenced by his position at the bottom of the staircase, close to the door and the outside world. As a farmer, the husband is more accepting of the natural cycle of life and death in general, but also chooses to grieve in a more physical manner: by digging the grave for his child. Ironically, the husband’s expression of his grief is completely misunderstood by the wife; she views his behavior as a sign of his callous apathy.

Ultimately, each character is isolated from the other at opposite ends of the staircase. In order for the marriage to succeed, each character must travel an equal distance up or down the staircase in order to meet the other. The husband attempts to empathize with his wife, moving up the staircase toward her and essentially moving backward in his own journey towards acceptance of his child’s death. When the wife moves down the staircase, she assumes the upper hand in the power struggle between the two by ensuring that her husband cannot move between her and the door and stop her from leaving. Without the physical capacity to keep her from leaving, the husband must attempt to convince her to stay through communication - something that, as the poem demonstrates, has been largely unsuccessful throughout their marriage.

 Which results in the wife’s suicidal feeling and in the ultimate destruction of their marriage.

Right from the poem’s opening; the reader can see the conflict between The Reality behind a Crumbling Marriage Robert Frost’s poem “Home Burial” explores a complicated male-female dynamic in a crumbling marriage. As a way of reinforcing this issue in the poem, Robert H.Swennes asserts that the poem shows

“The decay of the marriage unit in a setting which is harshly realistic and material.” (Swennes, 366).

 “Home Burial” uncovers the conflict under the surface of a couple’s relationship and how the death of their child serves to amplify it. Frost demonstrates how convoluted the husband’s feelings are toward his wife and shows male dominance through symbolism, specific word choice, and body language used in the dialogue between them. Their deceased child symbolizes the decay of their relationship. This particular symbolism brings the destruction full circle in the last moment of the poem. Frost uses extensively the position of the two speakers on a staircase to symbolize the emotional and physical distance between the husband, who is never named, and his wife Amy. Frost ties all these elements in the poem to the theme of male dominance in the relationship; together these elements show the separation between the couple Amy and her husband. Frost makes a point early on to call the wife by her name, Amy, while leaving the husband nameless. In doing so, Frost emphasizes the idea that the husband’s feelings (or lack of) are not different from those of any other male in the society of the time; he fits into the stereotypical norm. Amy, in contrast, feels her grief on a personal level. This is why the reader is introduced to her by name; it shows her humanity on a relatable field. The husband asserts his feeling of dominance over his wife by questioning what it is she sees out of the window at the top of the stairs:

 “I will find out now – you must tell me, dear”. (“Home Burial”; L- 12).

The fact that he calls her “dear” is ironic because he has just demanded that she tell him what she sees that seems to trouble her. He does not make the demand in a concerned but in a controlling way. Calling her “dear” is another way for him to prove that she belongs to him and that he can make demands of her because he “loves” her. Frost suggests stereotypical feminine frailty in his description of the wife

 “[sinking] upon her skirts” at the inquiry from her husband (“Home Burial”;L- 8).

The child in this poem symbolizes a once fruitful intimate relationship between the couple. In the act of digging the grave and burying their dead child, the husband buried the product of their former loving relationship; he commits to the earth the proof of the couple’s sexual love (Kearns 194). The wife alludes to her own desire to commit to the earth their now failing marriage when she says:

 “friends make a pretense of following to the grave/…I won’t have grief/ So if I can change it” (L-109, 113, 114).

 Amy can only escape the turmoil in her life by following the product of her once loving relationship with her husband to the grave. Other people, as she says, only say they wish to follow others to the grave but do not because they still find some joy in life. She

“no longer conceives herself as a wife, her husband’s lover, or the mother of his future family” (Swennes 367).

 According to W. David Shaw, “if so homely and event as the death of a son cannot be domesticated, what is to avert the slide of life itself into some indefinite void?” (Shaw 167). Amy’s life is slipping away from her, heading towards the grave with her dead child and she intends to follow, as there appears to be no other alternative in her mind.

The staircase functions symbolically as a metaphor for the wife’s decent into death as an escape. The window is at the top of the stairs and through it the wife glimpses the graveyard (25). This glimpse is possible only at the top of the stairs, which may symbolize another world beyond the grief of this one. For the wife, the bottom of the stairs represents her escape. She must descend the stairs in order to leave her unhappy home and relationship; and to do so she must get past her husband, who now represents a stranger to her (33-34). Similarly, her friends “wishing” to go to the grave with loved ones seems fanciful to her; she intends to do more than just talk about it like them because she does not wish to live with her grief any longer. Frost implies suicide as a last resort for Amy and symbolizes it not only through a descent down the stairs but also through her would-be departure from the confines of her “grating and sexually brutal, household” (Swennes 369).

The diction used throughout the poem conveys further the husband’s dominance but also the wife’s strength in her desire to escape. Amy’s body language and her physical position in the house throughout the poem symbolize the separation and lack of affection in their relationship. The wife is standing quite a distance from her husband on the stairs, representing the distance in their relationship following the death of their child. The husband comments on this by saying:

 “I’m not so much/Unlike other folks as your

Standing there/Apart would make me out” (“Home Burial”; L- 62-64).

 Amy stands apart from him because she feels that his lack of emotion and inability to grieve and empathize takes him out of the plane of a being human and into that of a savage. The fact that the wife “challenges” him to tell her what he thinks she sees out of the upstairs window shows that she recognizes his attempt at dominance over her and wants to defy it. Amy shows much strength in the face of her controlling husband, which itself contradicts female weakness, an ideal presumably held by her husband. She refuses him any help in figuring out what she sees from the window and says:

                          With the least stiffening of her neck and silence.

                         She let him look, sure that he wouldn’t see, (“Home Burial”, L-14,15).

Showing some passive aggression in her silence and slightly stiffened neck, she does not feel that her husband has any emotional capacity, demonstrating the distance in their married life now that the one thing holding their relationship together is gone. The fact that Amy

 “[withdraws] shrinking from beneath his arm”. (“Home Burial”; L-34)

shows how he asserts his superiority through an attempt to console her that only causes her to withdraw within herself more fully. This perpetuates their misunderstanding of each other because they lack effective communication evidenced through the dialogue between them.

Their dialogue shows the basis for their strained relationship. The way he speaks

to Amy shows an air of condescension and even sounds patronizing. He makes no

attempt to understand the depth of her sorrow and does not recognize that he could

contribute to it, especially when he says,

 “my words are nearly always in offense.

I don’t know how to speak of anything

so as to please you” (“Home Burial”;L- 47,48,49).

 Although he says this, he makes no attempt to remedy his lack of understanding and insensitivity. When he says she

To take your mother-loss of a first child

So inconsolably—in the face of love.

You’d think his memory might be satisfied—’(“Home Burial”;L- 67,68,69)

 this would-be loving spouse implies that there is still love left in the relationship

The wife feels that this love died with their child and so she disdains her husband’s lack of understanding for her deep despondence.

Almost as if he feels he is speaking to another species, the husband reveals a deep- seated sense of male superiority when he says:

A man must partly give up being a man

With women-folk. We could have some arrangement(“Home Burial”;L- 51,52).

Simply by accusing the husband of being insensitive to their son’s death, the wife shows that ‘each type believes the other to be inferior to itself”(Shaw 166).

Frost’s use of the words “man” and “woman” to differentiate and identify

the two speakers rather than giving them both names enforces this theme of inferiority.

The words suggest also the difference between “generic” nameless male “feeling” and Amy’s deeply personal desolation. When the husband asks,

 “Can’t a man speak of his own child he’s lost”, (“Home Burial”; L-75)

the word “man” emphasizes the weight he places on his being the male in the relationship (36). He implies also feelings of possession regarding their deceased child when he speaks of the child “he’s lost” without reference to the fact that Amy has lost a child too. The wife, being the maternal figure, feels she is entitled to grieve because she has a deeper connection with the child that she birthed. She asserts this when she says in response to his question,

 “I don’t know rightly whether any man can” (“Home Burial”; L- 39).

. The word “mounting” in contrast to “cowered” implies the contrast between what should be pleasurable between a couple and what is actually controlling and frightening. It is inferred that his governance over her life extends into areas that should afford pleasure as well, leading into the further conflict of the death of their child as a symbol of their lost intimacy and now doomed marriage. In the final scene between these former lovers, the husband shouts at his wife as she opens wider the door to their home, symbolically heading closer to the conclusion of her life and permanently ending her doomed marriage. He calls after her,

‘If—you—do!’ She was opening the door wider.

‘Where do you mean to go?  First tell me that.

I’ll follow and bring you back by force.  I will!—’(“Home Burial”L-119-121)

 The husband does not understand that by following his wife where she intends to go, not only will he be unable to bring her back, but he will also be unable to return himself. Unbeknownst to this hard, unfeeling man, by attempting to control the last effort from Amy, he is committing himself to her chosen fate. The husband has condemned their love to death, unwittingly. The closing act of their life as a couple becomes the commission of their marriage to the earth, just as they have done with their dead son. No rebirth comes from these “plantings” in the dirt, only ultimate destruction of their already crumbling marriage, the ultimate “home” burial.

"Birches" is another extremely symbolic poem. In the poem Birches by Robert Frost, Frost portrays the images of a child growing to adulthood through the symbolism of aging birch trees. Through these images readers are able to see the reality of the real world compared to their carefree childhood. The image of life through tribulation is the main focal point of the poem and the second point of the poem is if one could revert back to the simpler times of childhood. The language of the poem is entirely arranged through images, although it contains some diction it lacks sound devices, metaphors, and similes compared to other published works by Frost. The first half of the poems’ images are of life, coming of age, and death.
The first three lines in the poem represent the image of childhood and adulthood.

“When I see birches bend to left and right

Across the lines of straighter darker trees,

I like to think some boy’s been swinging them.”( "Birches";L,1-3)

Childhood is represented when the branches swing Frost thinks there is a boy swinging on them. Adulthood is represented by straighter darker trees because darker is a reference to older trees just by the nature of the color as compared to a birch tree which is white or light in color. “But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay. Ice storms do. Often you must have seen them Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning. In this poem the poet relates a common incident when, he, as a boy was jumping from one branch to another of birches, but as the poem progresses, the poet quietly introduces a deep philosophy that love, of earth is essential for climbing heavenward. All this is done so effortlessly that the ordinary reader fails to take notice of it on a  casual   reading, but when we turn to the poem repeatedly, we are amazed to find a wealth of thought the following lines contain :

I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.( "Birches";L,55-60)

An important criterion of great poetry is that it does not yield its meaning at the first reading We have to go back to it again and again to appreciate it properly, and every time we take it up, even after years of interval, it looks fresh and an unthought-of facet of it ,is presented to our understanding.

Another very significant poem from the point of view of inherent symbolism is "An Old Man's Winter Night." The poem tells us of an old man sitting alone in his farmhouse on an intense winter night. We find him standing alone in a "creaking room", unable to see anything out of the windows, unable to remember the reason of his com­ing here.   The imagery of night in the poem is very significant:

A light he was to no one but himself

Where now he sat, concerned with he knew not what,

                           A quiet light, and then not even that.( "An Old Man's Winter Night."L-15,16,17)

The inner light goes out as he falls asleep, and all that remains is the concealed light which is coming from the stove and the pale moon­light outside. The faint light emphasizes the fact that the light of this old man is also out and he himself does not know the reason of his living. His life is a living death almost.   Thus the poem is not only a poem of old age, it is also a poem about death.   Since old age, night and winter are mixed by the poet into one, we see death as a disappearance of order and meaning.   Order and meaning in external world depend upon the organizing power of the mind.   On this symbolic level too we can appreciate this poem.   However, the whole meaning of the poem is more complex.   Frost emphasizes the fact that there are two kinds of order, human and natural.   When human order is destroyed.-natural order still continues.   So, when the old man is not able to keep his house, farm and countryside, these are kept by the moon.   The house and the farm, when combined with the countryside, take on a very wide significance.   The farmstead, like the house in which T. S. Eliot pictures "Gerontian" suggests, says  Lyncn,  "human  institutions, society as a whole, and even an entire culture ; and the countryside of the old man, the nation, and beyond this, the world."

The poem “Mowing” is one of the most anthologized poems of Robert Frost. It is also the symbolical poem of Robert Frost. It is a significant lyric which was first published in A boy’s Will. It is subtle poem in which the poet describes one of the basic and most important activities in the field of agriculture.

Ostensibly, the speaker muses about the sound a scythe makes mowing hay in a field by a forest, and what this sound might signify. He rejects the idea that it speaks of something dreamlike or supernatural, concluding that reality of the work itself is rewarding enough, and the speaker need not call on fanciful invention.

As the narrator works in the field on a hot day, he notices that his scythe seems to be whispering as it works. The narrator is unable to hear what the scythe is saying, and he admits the possibility that the whispering sound is simply his imagination or even the result of heatstroke. He eventually concludes that the scythe is expressing its own beliefs about the world. Instead of dreaming about inactivity or reward for its labor as a person would, the scythe takes its sole pleasure from its hard work. It receives satisfaction from “the fact” of its earnest labor in the field, not from transient dreams or irrational hopes. As the poem ends, the narrator ceases his own unimportant musings and follows the scythe’s example: seizing on the pleasure of hard work and making hay.

This poem is one of the first in which Frost utilizes his “sound of sense” technique. Within this technique, the poet employs specific sounds and syllables in order to construct an aural feeling of the subject and narrative intention. In this case, both the repeated use of the term “whisper” and the swaying motion of the meter in certain lines

“Something perhaps, about the lack of sound”(“Mowing” L-5)

It is provide a visceral sense of the scythe moving back and forth as it cuts the hay in the field.
The fact that Frost uses the word “whisper” is significant because it personifies the scythe, transforming it into a companion and working colleague for the narrator rather than an inanimate farming tool. With that in mind, the scythe and its philosophical view on work could actually be seen as a reflection of the narrator’s own beliefs, or rather a belief that the farmer hopes to have as he continues to work on his farm. The circular nature of the poem supports this claim: by the end of the poem, the narrator has stopped attempting to analyze the scythe’s whispering within his imagination and has resorted to simple, honest work.
This mentality can be expanded as Frost’s justification of his own poetic sensibility. Frost was well known (and often criticized) for writing poetry about everyday life on the farms of New England - a topic that did not always seem appropriate for the high art of poetry. Yet, as Frost points out in “Mowing,” truth and fact are far more significant than imaginative fancies of gold and elves. In other words, his emphasis on reality — the lives and struggles of real people — makes his poetry sweeter and more effective than any traditional sonnet that narrates fairytale lands.

The first thing that struck me on reading it, and which would probably occur to even the most blunt-brained reader, was the prevalence of lush, sibilant whispering s-sounds thought the piece which emulate the sound of the scythe scarping off the grass.

Through the use of the first person, the inverted syntax of the opening line which creates suspense and curiosity, and lines like L4&5, Frost gives this piece a conversational tone, as if one were sitting in a room with him while he tells a story.

Much of it is also cast in the negative: "knew not well", "there was never a sound" but that of the scythe, "it was no dream of ...idle hours", "[it was no dream of] ... easy gold". These negative statements, like the opening line, defer the revelation of what the scythe whispers to the end of the poem, impelling the reader to read on to discover the scythe's secret.

The scythe as symbol, It is really used symbolically. The Poet said that..

There was never a sound beside the wood but one,
And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.(“Mowing”; L-1, 2)

Stripped of everything, this poem is a monologue about a scythe. A worker is mowing, but Frost doesn't write about the worker or the field - only the sound of the scythe. And that sound is quiet. It is a whisper. How very different from the swinging arc of the scythe which cuts mercilessly: scything is in truth fearful and forceful and violent. It destroys and cuts down life. Is not death portrayed as a hooded skeleton carrying a scythe? The scythe has long been used as a symbol for time which harvests us all in death.

"Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak..." And there lies our key to unlocking this poem. Our normal way of speaking would have been to say "Anything less than the truth." But Frost wants nothing more than the truth. To convey more than the truth would be to dream. Truth is less than dream. And now we see the import of those negatives. Truth is a cutting away, a narrowing down, a removing of what is not relevant. Like scything, really.

Frost has lovingly and laboriously laid the lines of the poem like rows of swale and to understand them you have to lean in close to hear the whisper of the scythe. But that meaning is elusive. It isn't handed to you. The meaning of the poem is made, like hay, through labor and is always, by definition, incomplete.

Frosts use of "orchises" and the scythe being described as "long and hard" is quite significant. Orchises is derived from the Greek word, Orchis, meaning "testicles" and the sycthe is obviously a phallic symbol. This fits in well, for those familiar with Frosts life, as he was a latent homosexual.

The poem "After Apple Picking" can also be appreciated on the symbolic level. Robert Frost “After Apple Picking” This extract comes from North of Boston, a selection of poems from the eminent American poet Robert Frost. Like most of the other poems in the book, Frost's After Apple Picking reads like a short drama. Like The Mending Wall or the Woodpile, this poem is narrated from a first-person point of view, where the poet refers to himself as "I" and is a principal actor in the poem- continuing to describe his setting, emotions and thoughts throughout. Frost, who is renowned for his figurative use of language, is sometimes counted amongst the ranks of the transcendentalist poets. Transcendentalism often amounted to drawing upon an individual sense of consciousness whilst eschewing the intellectualism of the day. A greater spiritual appreciation was appraised for the setting that influenced the transcendentalist and, thus, North of Boston is imbued with a dreamy quality whilst still retaining a vivid appreciation of nature. It is also interesting to note that some literary critics have called the transcendentalism an "American Romanticism" movement- and indeed, many of Frost's poems have a strong inclination toward nature combined with aesthetic appreciation for emotion and feeling. After Apple Picking is, in itself, a marvelous representation of Frost's philosophy and writing style- though it is somewhat unfortunate that no definite interpretations of the poem can be agreed upon.

The poem describes the experiences of an apple-picker who has been working throughout the day with his long two-pointed ladder which is stitl looking up towards the sky. In the poem "After Apple Picking", Robert Frost uses many symbols to enhance the meaning of the poem. The apple in the poem could be symbolic of be said to be the forbidden fruit from the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden was basically the beginning of everything earthly and heavenly, therefore repelling death. For you to understand the poem, you have to realize that for something to be dead, it must have been alive before. This may not be the central theme of the poem but Frost's symbolic use of the apple makes this concept as important. This poem is about life but its focuses are what are in between, the missed life experiences and the regret that the speaker is left with.

 He can still see the unpicked apples hanging on the branches. But he is obviously tired and is in no mood to go on. The smell of the apples and his own tiredness conspire to make him drowsy and he lies down to sleep. This is the concrete experience very realistically presented by the poet. But the poem invites a symbolic interpretation as well. The drowsiness which the apple-picker feels after the day's labor is associated with the cycle of seasons Its special character is emphasized by a bit of magic:

Essence of winter sleep is on the night.

  The scent of apples. I am drowsing off

 I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight

 I got from looking through a pane of glass

I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough

And held against the world of heavy grass,

                             It melted, and I let it fall and break.(“After Apple Picking”; L, 7-12)

The speaker then speculates about the forms which his dream­ing will take.    He feels that the apples will   still  come  in his dream for his instep arch still feels the pressure of the ladder rung,  and his cars are still full of the rumble of apples rolling into the cellar cabin. But he returns to the subject of his drowsiness and the phrase 'what­ever sleep it is' renews his suggestion that his sleepiness may not be ordinary human sleepiness:

 Were he not gone,

The woodchuck could say whether it's like his

Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,

                                           Or just some human sleep. .(“After Apple Picking”; L, 39-42)

The end of the labor sends the poet a sense of fulfillment. In the words of Cleanth Brooks, "The poem even suggests that sleep is like the sleep of death. We are not to feel that the speaker is essentially conscious of this. But perhaps we are to feel that were the analogy to present itself to him, he would accept it. In the context defined in the poem, death might be considered as something eminently natural as a sense of fulfillment mixed with a great deal of honest weariness and a sense of something well done—though with too much drowsiness, for one to bother that every one of the apples had not been picked."

Robert Frost used the action of picking apples in After Apple-Picking to signify any task and drowsiness to symbolize the changing of the seasons. In custom research papers on After Apple-Picking, it is shown that both concepts take on a boarder meaning in After Apple-Picking, as does the act of sleep itself. The research papers show at the end of After Apple-Picking the worker is filled with a sense of fulfillment, just as one would be at the end of a life well lived. In reading After Apple-Picking, the reader is free to apply After Apple-Picking strictly to a New England task of picking and storing the apples before the changing of the seasons or to apply the boarder meaning as related to life in general.