The Road Not Taken

Nothing not to be loved about this legendary Robert Frost poem, although I must confess that I have happened to stumble upon it only recently. A gem, to tell you the truth, if only due to the immense power, ease and expertise with which the poet elucidates the most difficult of ideas, using the simplest of metaphors. Unlike many other so-called inspiring poems that I have come across, this one clearly indicates that choice is simply inevitable; without relying on the use of any moral implications. Frost skillfully narrates that no matter how much you want to discover both the roads, you have to choose just one, since travelling on both is humanly unattainable. The ‘sigh’ in the end explains it all and to me the beauty of the whole poem is engulfed in the last stanza.  
Has to be my all time favourite Frost piece of course after the brilliant “Stopping by woods on a snowy evening”.


TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


By Robert Frost 

Photo Credit: Google Images


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