The Tuft of Flowers Summary & Analysis
by Robert Frost

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The Full Text of “The Tuft of Flowers”

1I went to turn the grass once after one

2Who mowed it in the dew before the sun.

3The dew was gone that made his blade so keen

4Before I came to view the levelled scene.

5I looked for him behind an isle of trees;

6I listened for his whetstone on the breeze.

7But he had gone his way, the grass all mown,

8And I must be, as he had been,—alone,

9‘As all must be,’ I said within my heart,

10‘Whether they work together or apart.’

11But as I said it, swift there passed me by

12On noiseless wing a ’wildered butterfly,

13Seeking with memories grown dim o’er night

14Some resting flower of yesterday’s delight.

15And once I marked his flight go round and round,

16As where some flower lay withering on the ground.

17And then he flew as far as eye could see,

18And then on tremulous wing came back to me.

19I thought of questions that have no reply,

20And would have turned to toss the grass to dry;

21But he turned first, and led my eye to look

22At a tall tuft of flowers beside a brook,

23A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared

24Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared.

25I left my place to know them by their name,

26Finding them butterfly weed when I came.

27The mower in the dew had loved them thus,

28By leaving them to flourish, not for us,

29Nor yet to draw one thought of ours to him.

30But from sheer morning gladness at the brim.

31The butterfly and I had lit upon,

32Nevertheless, a message from the dawn,

33That made me hear the wakening birds around,

34And hear his long scythe whispering to the ground,

35And feel a spirit kindred to my own;

36So that henceforth I worked no more alone;

37But glad with him, I worked as with his aid,

38And weary, sought at noon with him the shade;

39And dreaming, as it were, held brotherly speech

40With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach.

41‘Men work together.’ I told him from the heart,

42‘Whether they work together or apart.’

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Introduction

    • "The Tuft of Flowers" appeared in American poet Robert Frost's first collection, A Boy's Will, in 1913. While many of the poems in this highly autobiographical collection describe a desire to remain somewhat separate from society, "The Tuft of Flowers" expresses a deep longing to connect with other people. The poem's speaker is a lonely field hand who stumbles upon a patch of flowers that his fellow worker, a "mower," has left untouched. The speaker feels a sense of kinship and camaraderie with his unseen coworker in this moment that cuts through his isolation. In this way, the poem explores how a shared appreciation for nature can bring people together, even if only in spirit.

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Summary

    • One time, I started to flip the grass (to help dry it out) after someone else had already cut it in the cool, dewy early hours before sunrise.

      The same dew that made the mower's grass-cutting scythe so sharp had evaporated before I arrived and took in the freshly-mowed field.

      I searched for the mower behind an isolated patch of trees. I listened for the sound of him sharpening his blade in the gentle wind.

      But he had already left, the grass having been cut, and I was alone in the same way he had been alone before I arrived.

      "Just like everyone is ultimately alone," some deep part of me thought, "Whether they work alongside each other or separately."

      Yet even as I said this, a confused butterfly quickly flew past me on silent wings.

      It seemed to be looking, relying on memories that had faded overnight, for some sleeping flower that it enjoyed yesterday.

      I watched him fly in a circle as if circling around some flower that was dying in the grass.

      He flew so far away that I almost lost track of him, but then, on shuddering wings, he flew back to me.

      I thought about things I might ask that have no answers, and I would have turned around to resume my work flipping the grass so that it could dry out in the sun.

      But the butterfly turned first, his flight drawing my eye to a tall bunch of flowers next to a creek.

      There was a vibrant bunch of blossoms that the mower's blade had left uncut, growing next a reed-filled creek that the mower's blade had revealed.

      I went over to them to figure out what they were, and discovered they were butterfly weed.

      That early morning mower had loved them by letting them live and thrive, though not for my and the butterfly's sake.

      The mower didn't spare the flowers so that we would think of him when we saw them. Instead, he did so out simply because he was so overwhelmed with happiness that morning.

      Even so, the butterfly and I had happened upon a sort of message left for us from that morning.

      This message made me become aware of the birds waking up all around me, and I heard the mower's long blade falling quietly to the ground.

      I felt a connection between the mower's spirit and my own, and thus from that point on, I no longer worked alone.

      Instead, in sharing such joy with him, I worked as if he were there helping me, and when I grew tired at noon I looked to sit with him in the shade.

      And in this dream we talked as if we were brothers, even though I hadn't thought I'd ever be able to speak to him.

      "People work together," I told him, and meant it, "Whether they work alongside each other or separately."

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Themes

    • Theme Isolation and Connection

      Isolation and Connection

      “The Tuft of Flowers” follows one man's movement from loneliness and isolation to a sense of connection. The poem’s speaker is a lonely mower whose job is to spread out the grass that someone else has cut so that it can dry in the sun. He doesn’t ever bump into his fellow mower, and thinks that even if he did, it wouldn’t change his feeling of isolation; he believes that people can’t ever really know what’s going on inside someone else’s head, and thus are essentially alone in the world “Whether together or apart,” the speaker initially believes, people are always somehow separate from one another.

      Just as the speaker comes to this conclusion, however, he catches sight of a tuft of flowers that his fellow mower must have spared. His appreciation of these flowers and his affection for the person who left them behind makes the speaker realize that he’s not entirely alone after all. While people may never really know what’s going on in each other’s hearts, the poem ultimately suggests, they can still find comfort in recognizing kindred spirits.

      The poem begins with the speaker working in a field and looking around for the mower who was working earlier in the day, perhaps hoping for a little human connection. But he doesn’t see him: though the two men’s jobs overlap, they remain isolated. Describing himself as “alone [...] as all must be,” the speaker even suggests that such loneliness and isolation are an inherent part of being human. T o the speaker, people can’t ever really know what someone else is feeling inside. And because of this, it doesn’t matter whether they’re next to each other or miles apart: it will still be impossible to share the deepest parts of themselves.

      But the sight of a tuft of flowers the earlier mower spared reveals the way in which people are connected. A shared sense of beauty, this moment suggests, can cut through human isolation. Though the other mower isn’t there to explain his motive for leaving the flowers uncut, it isn’t difficult for the speaker to guess: he feels a sudden joy in looking at them, and can imagine the “sheer morning gladness” that moved the other mower to stop and set aside his blade. He and the earlier mower, he realizes, must have shared both a concern for the butterflies that feed on these flowers and an appreciation for the beauty of the flowers themselves.

      The sight of these flowers makes the speaker realize that, though their paths do not cross, he and this other worker are “kindred” spirits, who both had the same thoughts and feelings as they looked at the flowers and the butterflies. Knowing this, he no longer feels alone : “whether they work together or apart,” he concludes, people can still connect through a shared sense of wonder and beauty.

    • Theme Nature and Humanity

      Nature and Humanity

      The poem suggests that even the smallest encounters with nature can help people feel more connected with the earth and with each other. The lonely speaker feels concerned for a butterfly that seems to be looking for flowers that have been recently mowed down. He’s thus both relieved and moved to see that an earlier mower has spared a tuft of flowers, seemingly on the butterfly's behalf. Seeing that he and the earlier mower both appreciated the beauty of nature makes the speaker feel like part of a bigger whole. In this way, the poem suggests that paying attention to nature and sharing in its delights can foster a sense of joy and connection.

      While he feels isolated at first, the speaker feels immediate empathy for a butterfly—suggesting that the natural world can help remind people that they’re not actually alone in the world. When this butterfly sweeps past the lonely speaker, seeming to search for a flower that has been mowed down, the speaker empathizes with the butterfly’s predicament. Perhaps he even relates to the little creature: at the beginning of the poem, he, too, was looking for something he couldn’t find (the other mower). His sense that he can understand the butterfly’s feelings connects him to the natural world around him.

      The speaker is thus overjoyed when he discovers the earlier mower has carefully left behind a clump of flowers: not only will these flowers feed the butterfly, but they also suggest that his connection with the natural world links him to other people. These aren’t just any old flowers, either, but a patch of “butterfly weed,” suggesting that the first mower must also have taken delight in both the flowers and the butterflies that feed on them. The flowers prove that somebody else looked at the beauty of nature felt the same concern and empathy that the speaker did.

      Seeing the flowers thus makes the speaker feel that he and his fellow mower are linked through their appreciation of nature. The speaker’s arrival at a sense of “brotherly” connection with his fellow worker suggests that a shared joy in nature can help people understand their deeper connection to the world and to each other. The poem shows that people, butterflies, and flowers all “work together” in the same interconnected world.

  • Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “The Tuft of Flowers”

    • Lines 1-4

      I went to turn the grass once after one
      Who mowed it in the dew before the sun.
      The dew was gone that made his blade so keen
      Before I came to view the levelled scene.

      The speaker has arrived to "turn the grass" after someone else mowed it much earlier in the morning, "before the sun" had fully risen and the grass was still damp with dew. This turning is part of the process of making hay; it's the speaker's job to flip the grass over so that it will dry out.

      This job does not require him to see the mower, who is long gone by the time the speaker comes to "view the levelled [that is, freshly cut] scene." And as the speaker looks out, presumably on a field or some other expanse of grass, and the reader perhaps already gets a sense of his loneliness as he prepares to do his job.

      The sounds of these lines elevate the speaker's direct, straightforward language, infusing the lines with gentle music. Note the assonance, consonance, and alliteration of lines 3-4, for example:

      The dew was gone that made his blade so keen
      Before I came to view the levelled scene.

      There's even an internal rhyme here between "made" and "blade," that combines with the ringing sharpness of the word "keen" to make the mower's gleaming scythe vivid for the reader (a scythe is sharp tool used to cut grass—there were no riding mowers in Frost's time!).

      The poem also quickly establishes an orderly rhythm with the use of iambic pentameter. This means there are five iambs per line, poetic feet made up of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable: da-DUM. When read aloud, the poem thus has a pleasantly bouncy rhythm to it:

      I went | to turn | the grass | once af- | ter one
      Who mowed | it in | the dew | before | the sun.

      Notice that the use of iambs isn't entirely strict: the second foot in the second line contains two unstressed beats, for example. But for the most part, the poem follows this unstressed-stressed rhythm closely, creating a measured, and maybe even soothing, tone. The use of the word "once" in the first line of the poem suggests the upcoming narrative arc of the poem: it rings faintly of "once upon a time," alerting the reader to the poem's intention of telling a story.

      The poem's rhyme scheme also becomes quickly apparent: each stanza is a rhyming couplet. More specifically, they're something called heroic couplets (rhyming pairs of iambic pentameter):

      • Heroic couplets were made famous by Chaucer and later used by 17th and 18th century poets writing about the heroic deeds of great men.
      • This history lends an interesting undercurrent to this poem about a man who is simply getting ready to turn the grass to dry: clearly there's more at stake in this poem than what immediately presents itself in these opening lines.
      • And, as the name suggests, the heroic couplet form means that these lines are bound together by rhythm and rhyme that ring out loudly and clearly to readers.
    • Lines 5-10

      I looked for him behind an isle of trees;
      I listened for his whetstone on the breeze.
      But he had gone his way, the grass all mown,
      And I must be, as he had been,—alone,
      ‘As all must be,’ I said within my heart,
      ‘Whether they work together or apart.’

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    • Lines 11-14

      But as I said it, swift there passed me by
      On noiseless wing a ’wildered butterfly,
      Seeking with memories grown dim o’er night
      Some resting flower of yesterday’s delight.

    • Lines 15-18

      And once I marked his flight go round and round,
      As where some flower lay withering on the ground.
      And then he flew as far as eye could see,
      And then on tremulous wing came back to me.

    • Lines 19-22

      I thought of questions that have no reply,
      And would have turned to toss the grass to dry;
      But he turned first, and led my eye to look
      At a tall tuft of flowers beside a brook,

    • Lines 23-26

      A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared
      Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared.
      I left my place to know them by their name,
      Finding them butterfly weed when I came.

    • Lines 27-30

      The mower in the dew had loved them thus,
      By leaving them to flourish, not for us,
      Nor yet to draw one thought of ours to him.
      But from sheer morning gladness at the brim.

    • Lines 31-34

      The butterfly and I had lit upon,
      Nevertheless, a message from the dawn,
      That made me hear the wakening birds around,
      And hear his long scythe whispering to the ground,

    • Lines 35-40

      And feel a spirit kindred to my own;
      So that henceforth I worked no more alone;
      But glad with him, I worked as with his aid,
      And weary, sought at noon with him the shade;
      And dreaming, as it were, held brotherly speech
      With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach.

    • Lines 41-42

      ‘Men work together.’ I told him from the heart,
      ‘Whether they work together or apart.’

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Symbols

    • Symbol The Butterfly

      The Butterfly

      The butterfly symbolizes the speaker himself, and more specifically his longing for connection.

      Just as the speaker comes to the conclusion in that he is utterly alone in the world, a butterfly flies past, seeming to interrupt his train of thought. Rather than continuing to focus on his own isolation, the speaker instead considers the predicament of the butterfly.

      • The speaker personifies the creature, seeming to project his own fears and desires onto the butterfly's "'wildered," or bewildered/confused, movements.
      • The speaker identifies with the butterfly's search for "some resting flower of yesterday's delight" and worries that this flower is most likely "withering on the ground"—in other words, that the butterfly won't find the nectar it seeks.
      • The butterfly, like the speaker, seems isolated and tired, going "round and round" in search of a flower that may not exist, much like the speaker asks "questions that have no reply."

      But the butterfly then leads the speaker to the "tuft of flowers" growing next to a creek. The speaker's encounter with these flowers, in turn, allows him to feel a sense of connection with another person—to find a "reply" of sorts. Just as the butterfly finds nourishment in the "leaping tongue of bloom," the speaker finds comfort and strength in this "message" from the mower.

    • Symbol The Tuft of Flowers

      The Tuft of Flowers

      The flowers in this poem symbolize the joy and sense of connection experienced by both the speaker and the mower who chose not to cut them down.

      • When the speaker sees the flowers at the end of the poem, he feels this spark of joy precisely because they remind him that he's not really as alone as he might think. Despite literally working by himself, he is still connected to other people by "sheer morning gladness"—by being able to appreciate something as simple as a clump of flowers growing by a creek.
      • The flowers are a "message from the dawn" that remind the speaker of his place in an interconnected world. The speaker even describes the flowers as "a leaping tongue of bloom," suggesting that their very existence communicates something vital to the speaker—that they offer a "reply" to some of those unanswerable "questions" that the speaker keeps asking.
      • What's more, the speaker discovers that the flowers are specifically "butterfly weed." In other words, they are sustenance for his little friend, the butterfly who led him here. Not only is the speaker experiencing joy and connection, then, but the butterfly has also found what it needs.

      The flowers, then, symbolize not only the happiness shared by the speaker and the other mower, but also the joy of all living things whose fates are bound to one another's, regardless of whether they "work together or apart."

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

    • Metaphor

      The poem uses metaphors in lines 23 and 32. In the first instance, the speaker describes the clump of flowers he finds by the brook as "a leaping tongue of bloom." By comparing the flowers to a tongue, the poem implies that the flowers are capable of communication, or that they are calling out to the speaker. The poem circles back to this implication in line 32, when the speaker describes coming upon "a message from the dawn."

      This second metaphor reveals that the speaker perceives nature as a benevolent force that is trying to communicate with him, alerting him to the way in which he's connected to other beings. It's worth noting here that metaphor overlaps with personification. Just as the speaker personifies the butterfly and feels empathy for its plight, he also personifies the dawn by attributing to it the ability to communicate, to send a message.

      Both metaphors also subtly respond to line 19:

      I thought of questions that have no reply,

      In treating the flowers as "tongues" and describing "a message from the dawn," the speaker indicates that both offer a "reply" of sorts to all those questions he has been asking.

      Also note how the speaker describes the flowers not simply as a tongue but as a "leaping" tongue. The word "leaping" suggests energy, joy, and buoyancy. This metaphor thus also points to the "sheer [...] gladness" the speaker experiences in the flowers' presence. It is this gladness, in turn, that makes him suddenly aware of the birds singing around him and makes him imagine the scythe slipping from the mower's hand.

    • Imagery

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    • Enjambment

    • Aphorism

    • Consonance

    • Alliteration

    • Assonance

    • Parallelism

    • Anaphora

    • Personification

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Vocabulary

    Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

    • Isle
    • Whetstone
    • 'Wildered
    • O'er
    • Tremulous
    • Tuft
    • Scythe
    • Kindred
    • Henceforth
    Isle
    • An island.

  • Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “The Tuft of Flowers”

    • Form

      "The Tuft of Flowers" is made up of 21 rhyming couplets. More specifically these are heroic couplets, because they're written in iambic pentameter (more on that in the Meter section of this guide).

      This neat and tidy form gives the poem a feeling of orderliness and restraint, which, in turn, suits the poem's narrative quality (i.e., the fact that the poem is telling a story). The concise quality of the couplets lends itself to the direct and soothing tone of the poem; the speaker is trying to convey something very specific, something that he finds helpful and hopeful. In this way, the poem invites the reader to journey through this specific memory with the speaker and arrive at the same moral or lesson that the speaker himself did.

    • Meter

      The poem is written in iambic pentameter, meaning that, for the most part, each line contains five iambs. These are metrical feet that follow an unstressed-stressed syllable pattern (so when read aloud, the line will have a noticeable da-DUM sound). The first line is a perfect example of this meter in action:

      I went | to turn | the grass | once af- | ter one

      By and large the poem sticks to this pattern, lending the speaker's story a sense of calm, steady rhythm. And when the poem does occasionally veer away from this meter, it never does so too drastically. Line 10, for example, begins with a trochee, or a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable (and also features another trochee in its fourth foot):

      Whether | they work | togeth- | er or | apart

      Lines 13 and 26 both begin with a trochee ("Seeking" and "Finding") as well, a sonic connection that emphasizes the relationship between these concepts within the poem. The poem is interested in the relationship between seeking and finding connection, so it makes sense that these words would stand out when read aloud!

      Others line contain an extra syllable, but minor variations like this aren't uncommon in long metered poems. One moment of variation that is particularly interesting, however, comes in line 16. This line contains two extra syllables, and its metrical feet are also irregular: its opening iamb is followed by a spondee (two stressed beats in a row), another iamb, a pyrrhic (two unstressed beats in a row), and a final iamb:

      As where | some flow- | er lay | wither- | ing on | the ground.

      The disrupted meter in this line seems to coincide with a low point in the poem: both the speaker and butterfly are lost, disconnected, alone, unable to find what they are searching for. Yet the meter is restored in the very next line; this moment of isolation and despair doesn't last.

    • Rhyme Scheme

      The poem is made up of 21 rhyming couplets, and thus follows a rhyme scheme:

      AA BB CC DD

      ...and so on. Technically these are called heroic couplets—that is, matching pairs of rhyming iambic pentameter (more on what iambic pentameter is in the meter section of this guide). What's important to note here is that each couplet maintains a steady rhythm and that its end rhymes ring out clearly to the reader. This rhyme scheme is very tidy and forceful: there's no overlooking those end rhymes, especially since the poem uses only full rhymes as opposed to half or slant rhymes.

      The heroic couplet was traditionally used by poets in the 17th and 18th centuries in poems describing the great deeds of heroic figures—thus the name! On its surface, "The Tuft of Flowers" doesn't seem to have anything to do with such poems, so it's worth considering what Frost might have intended when he chose to use this somewhat antiquated rhyme scheme.

      One possibility is that with the heroic couplet, lines appear dramatically in pairs: each line is bound by meter and rhyme to another. This would seem to emphasize the speaker's burgeoning belief that no one is ever really alone—that no matter how things appear on the surface, everyone and everything is deeply connected to everyone and everything else. No line, and therefore no person, is really separate from any other.

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Speaker

    • The poem's speaker is someone whose job it is to "turn the grass" during the process of making hay—that is, to rearrange the grass after it has been cut by a mower so that it can dry out in the sun. (Note that, back when Frost wrote this poem, mowing was done by hand—not farm tools!)

      The speaker's job is an isolating one, given that there's no interaction with the person who came by earlier in the day to actually mow the grass. And the speaker is someone who, at the beginning of the poem, not only feels disconnected from other people, but believes this isolation is just part of being human. He does not initially "hope to reach" anyone else because he thinks that people are all more or less cut off from each other—that they are inherently alone in their innermost thoughts and feelings. The poem then follows this person's transformation into someone who believes just the opposite: that whether people physically work "together or apart," they are deeply connected to each other and to the earth itself.

      Note that Frost himself considered his collection, A Boy's Will, and this poem in particular, as being autobiographical in nature. (This is why we've referred to the speaker as male throughout this guide; do note that the speaker is never gendered in the poem itself, and can certainly be read as being a woman.) Frost went through a period of time when he withdrew from society, but his love for nature and philosophy ultimately led him towards feeling more connected with other people—a process this poem testifies to.

  • “The Tuft of Flowers” Setting

    • The poem takes place in a field filled that was mowed earlier in the day. The speaker's job is to rearrange this freshly cut grass so that it can dry out in the sun (part of the process for making hay). The sun has already caused the early morning dew to evaporate—a reminder that seemingly all traces of the earlier mower's presence have disappeared by the time the speaker shows up to do his job. The scene feels empty and deeply lonely, as the speaker can neither see his fellow worker nor hear "his whetstone on the breeze."

      The setting shifts once the speaker catches sight of a butterfly. The butterfly appears bewildered; its food source, it seems, has been cut alongside the grass. The speaker follows the butterfly to a "reedy brook," next to which he finds a clump of flowers (specifically "butterfly weed") that the earlier mower left behind. The speaker takes this as a "message from the dawn"—that is, from the mower and the natural world itself—and then hears birds singing all around him as well as the sound of the other mower's scythe "whispering to the ground." These new sounds contrast with the poem's earlier silence, and remind the speaker that he isn't alone after all.

      At this point in the poem, the line between the poem's physical setting (the mown field later in the morning, the speaker standing beside a brook) blurs with the speaker's imagination: he is thinking of the other mower, standing in this same spot at dawn when the dew is still fresh. Likewise, the poem ends in the speaker's imagination; later in the day, after he's completed his work, he "seeks the shade" and dreams of sharing it with the other mower as they engage in "brotherly speech." In this way, the poem moves from a literal setting in which the speaker is physically alone to a setting in which the speaker is still physically alone yet mentally dreaming of connection.

  • Literary and Historical Context of “The Tuft of Flowers”

      Literary Context

      "The Tuft of Flowers" appeared in Robert Frost's first collection, A Boy's Will, published in 1913 in England (and reprinted in the United States in 1915). The title of the book is a reference to "My Lost Youth" by famed New England poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, which includes the lines:

      A boy's will is the wind's will
      And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.

      According to Frost, A Boy’s Will is highly autobiographical; the poems in the book more or less cover a period of five years in the poet's life in which he retreated from society and later found his way back. The title, then, is perhaps a reference to this time of defiant introspection, and “The Tuft of Flowers” in particular captures the spirit of Frost's return to society.

      The collection's broader themes include humanity's relationship to the natural world, rural life, philosophy, and individuality—all of which are themes that Frost would return to again and again throughout his life. These themes also link Frost with other New England poets such as Emily Dickinson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and William Wordsworth.

      Frost’s poetry rather uniquely straddles the line between the traditions of 19th century American poetry and the experimentation of 20th century Modernism. Compared to the very deliberate departures from traditional forms and techniques that his contemporaries (such as T.S. Eliot) were making, Frost was not particularly interested in innovation for innovation’s sake. While many poets in the aftermath of the first World War were breaking away from formal restrictions, Frost typically used more conventional meter and rhyme. At the same time, he used frank, contemporary language that tied his work in some ways to the Imagist poets.

      Frost himself consistently shied away from associating with any one particular school of writing. Instead, his work is notable for its incorporation of various traditions and techniques while also remaining highly accessible, earning him the distinction of being the most recognized American poet of the 20th century.

      Historical Context

      Though he lived through both World War I and II and saw many significant social and political shifts in his lifetime, Frost hardly ever wrote directly about history or politics. Instead, Frost’s poetry is known for dealing with rural New England life and identity. Having lived and worked on a New Hampshire farm from 1900-1912, Frost’s interest in rural life, nature, and New England is an extension of his time working the land in what he considered to be the best part of America.

      With an eye for austerity and tragedy, Frost’s work is known for its realism, particularly as it pertains to the difficulties of rural life and the indifference of nature. Like many poets of his time, Frost had a somewhat pessimistic view of the modern world that was perhaps intensified by his own significant personal losses. His father died of tuberculosis when he was only 11, leaving behind eight dollars for the family to survive on. His mother died of cancer five years later, in 1900, and in 1920 his younger sister was committed to a mental hospital, where she later died. Mental illness plagued his family, and both Frost and his wife struggled with depression.

      In spite of, or more like because of, these personal trials, Frost wrote diligently of individuals searching for meaning and finding, most often in nature, some kind of mirror for their own situations. His poems tend to highlight ordinary moments in which extraordinary or profound insights occur, and despite their straightforward and colloquial language, can often be interpreted in myriad ways (“The Road Not Taken” and “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening,” two of his most famous poems, are perfect examples).

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