Poetry Response #3

Garrett Kitchen

April 24th, 2013

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost is a poem about how The Author came upon a time in his life when he had to choose which path, or what he would do and be like, in life, and he chose the on less taken. The poem is one giant metaphor for subconsciously making the decision of what to do in life. This poem doesn’t have too many elements of poetry that actually relate to letters and syllables, but it has very good imagery and lyricism. This poem has the rhyme scheme ABAAB, and Frost strictly follows the scheme throughout the entire poem. I think the Frost put a strict rhyme scheme in such a serious poem, because he wanted to show that serious things can be playful, but also to make the poem flow better, and to lighten the mood a bit. This poem also has some assonance using double “l”s, “ I shall be telling this with a sigh”. Additionally this poem has some repetition in a few places, the first line repeats as the eighteenth line, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,”. The difference is after the first line Frost talks of how he has to make a decision and he is sorry he cannot travel both, but after the eighteenth line it talks about how he took the path less traveled by. Because the Author made the title of this poem: The Road Not Taken, I think it is about not just choosing which path to take, which the bulk of the poem seems to be about, but also about wondering what taking the other path would’ve been like, because if you take one path then there is another path left not taken. Frost uses certain words that help the poem flow, but also make it seem more meaningful, as if he wants to show the poem is worth using seldom used words to make the poem sound important. For example, “In leaves no step had trodden black.” also “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,” Frost could’ve said Two roads split in a yellow wood, but he said diverged, and that flows better, and sounds more intelligent and special.