<i>Birches</i> by Robert Frost Birches by Robert Frost

The poem has a circular structure, it begins with the title, "Birches" and ends with the word "birches". Frost often used a circular structure in his poems. The way the poem travels gives the reader a sense of returning to where they started but with a better picture at the end. Frost talks about the way the branches of the trees crack under the weight of the ice and how when they are warmed by the sun, the ice violently breaks away.

Soon the sun’s warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You’d think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.

Later in the poem he talks about wanting to go back to being a boy, playing on those branches.

It’s when I’m weary of considerations
I’d like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over
I’d like to go by climbing a birch tree

The feeling derived from the poem is one of unhappiness towards life and adult concerns.


K. Y. Hamilton, BA, MA - Copyright 3/27/01 -2006


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