The Road Frost Took

Of all the poems’ I’ve read, Robert Frost is by far my favorite poet. “The Road Not Taken,” is one of my all time favorites. I loved the symbolism he used, and the decisions in life being represented by a fork in the road.

It brought to mind how important the decisions we make can be. Although we might not know where a road or decision will lead us, our decisions have long-lasting effects sometimes. I found the diversity of students’ interpretations on this poem very interesting. When I first read the poem I thought Frost must have been thinking about his life as a poet and author when he wrote this. This made me think how lucky we were that he chose the road he did. If he chose another road, we wouldn’t have all the marvelous works he wrote. I was, however, very surprised when I read a passage of his from the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference in 1953. He was thinking of a friend who had gone off to war, when he finished the poem. He said he had written one stanza and found it three or four years later and couldn’t bear not to finish it. It made me realize that our perceptions are often incorrect. What we think about a particular poem may be impacted by our own beliefs and views. So, I guess it doesn’t really matter why he wrote the poem, it just matters that he did, and I LOVE IT.

Submitted by Kelsey Hynes