#LIFE IS TOO MUCH LIKE A PATHLESS WOOD HOW TO#

LitCharts on Other Poems by Robert FrostBirches is a narrative poem written by the American poet Robert Frost and first appeared in the August issue of Atlantic Monthly in 1915 and was later published in 1916 in his third collection of poetry called Mountain Interval.Learn more about Frost's thoughts on 'sound of sense,' a term he used to describe the significance of sound in poetry, especially when applied to straightforward but impassioned language. For more information about Robert Frost, take a look at this brief overview of his life and work.

#LIFE IS TOO MUCH LIKE A PATHLESS WOOD HOW TO#

Check out this video of somebody demonstrating how to swing from a birch tree.

Hear the poet himself read 'Birches' in this old recording. Read about Robert Frost's legacy in New England – where he swung from birches as a boy-and the farm that bears his name! Earth's the right place for love:ĥ3I don't know where it's likely to go better.ĥ4I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,ĥ5And climb black branches up a snow-white trunkĥ6 Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,ĥ7But dipped its top and set me down again.ĥ8That would be good both going and coming back.ĥ9One could do worse than be a swinger of birches. He always kept his poiseģ6To the top branches, climbing carefullyģ7With the same pains you use to fill a cupģ8Up to the brim, and even above the brim.ģ9Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,Ĥ0Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.Ĥ1So was I once myself a swinger of birches.Ĥ4And life is too much like a pathless woodĤ5Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebsĤ6Broken across it, and one eye is weepingĤ7From a twig's having lashed across it open.Ĥ9And then come back to it and begin over.ĥ1And half grant what I wish and snatch me awayĥ2Not to return. He learned all there wasģ3To learn about not launching out too soonģ5Clear to the ground. They click upon themselvesĨAs the breeze rises, and turn many-coloredĩAs the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.ġ0Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shellsġ1Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust-ġ2Such heaps of broken glass to sweep awayġ3You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.ġ4They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,ġ5And they seem not to break though once they are bowedġ6So low for long, they never right themselves:ġ7You may see their trunks arching in the woodsġ8Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the groundġ9Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hairĢ0Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.Ģ1But I was going to say when Truth broke inĢ2With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-stormĢ3I should prefer to have some boy bend themĢ4As he went out and in to fetch the cows-Ģ5Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,Ģ6Whose only play was what he found himself,Ģ7Summer or winter, and could play alone.Ģ8One by one he subdued his father's treesĢ9By riding them down over and over againģ0Until he took the stiffness out of them,ģ1And not one but hung limp, not one was leftģ2For him to conquer.

Often you must have seen themħAfter a rain. 1When I see birches bend to left and rightĢAcross the lines of straighter darker trees,ģI like to think some boy's been swinging them.ĤBut swinging doesn't bend them down to stayĥAs ice-storms do.

Life is too much like a pathless wood