The Two Worlds in Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening :: Stopping Woods Snowy Evening

The Two Worlds in taenia by Woods Stopping by Woods    The visible sign of the poets preoccupation is the recurrent exposure of dark woodwind and trees. The world of the woods, a world offering amend quiet and solitude, exists side by side with the realization that there is alike a nonher world, a world of people and social obligations. Both worlds take claims on the poet. He stops by woods on this darkest even of the year to watch them fill up with snow, and lingers so long that his petty(a) horse shakes his harness bells to ask if there is some mistake. The poet is put in mind of the promises he has to keep, of the miles he still must travel. We atomic number 18 non told, however, that the call of social responsibility proves stronger than the attraction of the woods, which are lovely as well as dark and deep the poet and his horse have not moved on at the poems end. The dichotomy of the poets obligations both to the woods and to a world of promises--the latter filtering like a barely heard replication through the almost hypnotic state induced by the woods and falling snow-is what gives this poem its singular interest.... The artfulness of Stopping by Woods consists in the way the two worlds are established and balanced. The poet is aware that the woods by which he is stopping belong to someone in the village they are owned by the world of men. But at the same condemnation they are his, the poets woods, too, by virtue of what they mean to him in terms of feeling and private signification. What appears to be simple is shown to be not really simple, what appears to be innocent not really innocent.... The poet is fascinated and lulled by the empty wastes of exsanguinous and black. The repetition of sleep in the final two lines suggests that he whitethorn succumb to the influences that are at work. There is no reason to venture that these influences are benignant. It is, after all, the darkest evening of the year, and the poet is alone b etween the woods and rooted(p) lake.