Saturday, December 04, 2010

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

There is a slight difference between the famous poem of the same title by Robert Frost and the fact that I stopped this afternoon near Albany, Minnesota. The difference is that I am stopping to stretch my legs, use the rest area, and walk a bit to wake-up.

I have been driving all day, the roads were, on the whole good once I left Minneapolis, but then, outside St. Augusta, the road was shut. (I would find out later that this was due to an accident involving a state highway patrolman.) I have sat for over an hour between two exits before I could jump off and go through the back roads and rejoin the interstate a few miles down.

It was a lovely evening, the sun is starting to go down and even though it is starting to go down. There was a lovely sight a few miles back. I watched a buck go bounding across the interstate a couple hundred yards ahead of where I was. He just missed getting himself hit by a semi, but it was lovely watching him bound his way across the interstate and over the safety fence at the side of the road.

Now I am stretching my legs and enjoying the quiet of the woods and the snow. But like the narrator of the poem, I have miles to go before I sleep. So I had best get back to driving!

Wherever you are, I hope that you're making progress toward your goals.

Don Bergquist - December 04, 2010 - Albany, Minnesota, USA
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sounds the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

A few months ago you mentioned in your blog that Ted Kennedy once used the last few lines of this poem in a speech. I commented in response that Ted Kennedy stole the words from the former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau who had used the same words in a speech. Thank you for showing me where the profound words about miles to go and promises to keep came from. Now that I see the context about the temptation to stay in the beautiful woods I think I have a better idea as to what the politicians might have meant when they quoted Robert Frost. I think they might have been saying that they really enjoyed the perks of their jobs but that they did not want to let the pleasures of being powerful keep them from doing the work that they needed to do.

Anonymous Reader

Unknown said...

Dear Anonymous Reader,

Thank you for reading and commenting on my blog!

Yes, I do remember commenting about one of the Kennedy clan misquoting this - or rather quoting the line and attributing it to the wrong poem. My recollection is that he attributed it to The Road Not Taken (a poem about individualism and the assertion of one's own personal choice) instead of Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening which is a poem about fulfillment of personal responsibility.

If one truly understands the text, (in my humble opinion) the politician who quotes this poem is saying that while delay may be pleasurable and dalliance may be our nature, we have a commitment to fulfill and any sidetracking merely delays the inevitable. Eventually, we have to fulfill our obligations.

Your spin on it is a valid one, but the melancholy of the scene, a cold day in the darkening evening would tend to make me think more of someone wistfully hoping to avoid (if only for a few minutes) completing a task he is committed to do. Notice that the speaker thinks even the horse believes this dalliance to be ill-advised.

In the end, he spurs the horse back into action and decided to go forward to accomplish what he set out to do.

But then, perhaps, that is just how I see it in a cold, gloomy afternoon while staring out at the frozen woods and ice of the lake beyond.

Thanks again for reading and commenting on my blog!

Don