My Summer Poem

“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost
Outline
Thesis Statement – More than one interpretation can be made of Robert Frost’s work. For example: nature being an escape from civilization, philosophical thinking of the human mind, and death as an escape from life.
Main Point – Nature is seen as a beautiful peaceful escape from civilization. The woods are a place where you can be alone and hear yourself think. In the woods you won’t find your homework time being interrupted by the neighbor’s loud party music. The woods are a place where no one will find you and where you can connect with your inner self spiritually.
Main Point – The human mind is a complicated thing to understand. The poem speaks philosophically to describe how the human mind has a conscience and how our conscience helps us distinguish right from wrong.
Main Point – Death is cold, lovely, and dark. The winter season is harsh and so is life. Death is an escape from “winter”, death is “easy wind and downy flake”.
Concluding Statement – Many interpretations can be created with this poem and the only limit to the interpretations is the creativity of our minds.

“Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost Essay Poems are at times difficult to understand and decipher. The use of language the poet decides to immerse the meaning within may be at fault. He does this though to get our heads to think outside the box so that we may realize that there is more than one meaning behind each story. It all depends on what stage of life we are experiencing in order to interpret the poet’s words. More than one interpretation can be made of Robert Frost’s work, “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”. The following are examples of interpretations that can be made from this poem: nature being an escape from civilization, philosophical thinking of the human mind, and death as an egress from life. Nature is seen as a beautiful peaceful escape from civilization. The narrator expresses from the second to fourth stanza that he wants to be left alone to watch the “woods fill up with snow”. These stanzas seem to describe that moment when you come home from a busy day of work and just sit in the car before entering the rowdy house full of life. The woods are a place where you can be alone and hear yourself think. Later in the poem, in the seventh and eighth stanzas, it is revealed that peace can be found between “the woods and frozen lake”. There you won’t find your homework time being interrupted by the neighbor’s loud party music and instead hear “the sweep of easy wind and downy flake”. The woods are a place where no one will find you and where you can connect with your inner self spiritually hence why “the woods are lovely” yet “dark and deep”. The human mind is a complicated thing to understand. The poem is a giant metaphor that speaks philosophically to describe how the human mind has a conscience and how our conscience helps us distinguish right from wrong. At the end of the first stanza the fact that the narrator has insecurities is exposed. In the following stanzas the narrator explains that he is trespassing and his “little horse”, which may symbolize his conscience, is wondering if he is sure about what he is doing. In the fifth stanza queer can be translated to irrational allowing the fifth and sixth stanza to support the fact that the horse may be his conscience. The next two stanzas seem to describe his midlife crisis which causes him to give in to the temptations that surround him. In the following stanzas his conscience shakes his bell to warn him from the temptation in the woods. Then in the thirteenth stanza the conscience is described to be full of secrets since the world, during Frost’s time, has no idea where this conscience lives and how it works, leaving us to the conclusion of the human mind being a mystery. Death is cold, lovely, and dark. The winter season is harsh and so is life. Death is an egress from “winter”; death is “easy wind and downy flake”. It is quite difficult to see where in the poem death comes into play as an interpretation. For death to be noticed as a theme it must be read to the very end because the last stanzas suggest that the narrator wants to remain in the woods and not go back to the village. Going back to the village would mean that he would continue on with life but staying in the woods where he is secluded “without a farmhouse” around he can silently be claimed by death. The narrator seems to be at a dark point in his life which is why he may be describing “the darkest evening of the year”. All of these stanzas create a melancholy mood creating the idea of death in our minds. Many interpretations can be created with this poem and the only limit to the interpretations is the creativity of our minds. As previously mentioned Frost reaches out to each of his readers on different levels of interpretation depending on their stage of life. Everyone doesn’t experience the same things so Frost has created a poem that can be meaningful or useful for each reader’s purpose which is absolutely brilliant. Poems are meant to connect the writer and reader in a whole new way only they can understand and this poem is a great example of the different connections it has made with all sorts of readers.