Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

My daughter and I recently read a great poem written by Robert Frost, entitled: Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. It's an exceedingly impressive work, to say the least: so much complexity contained in so simple a write. My daughter loved it too and essentially took it for a narrative poem. I felt as though the poem had a representative aspect that spoke of the beauty of life (the woods, the snow) and the inevitability of death (sleep), an aspect that Frost may have only inadvertently intended.

The structure of the poem is especially interesting- notice the rhyme scheme below:

Poetic Parameters:
Stanza: quatrain (4 total)
Meter: tetrameter
Rhyme Scheme: aaba bbcb ccdc dddd (similar to a Rubaiyat stanza)


Stopping by Wood on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I 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.


Of the Poem (One of Many Takes):

We find ourselves, as Heidegger might suggest, thrown into an existence that's nothing less than spectacular: there are the trees, the vaulted blue sky, florescent green grass after it rains- an inexhaustible amount of beautiful things. Indeed, the very idea that one is alive- existing- is marvelous in itself. In short, we're surrounded by an incredible, incredible amount of beauty.

All too often, however, we loose ourselves in mundane worldly matters, becoming so obsorbed in sustaining existence that we tend to loose sight of its very beauty, its splendor. Aesthetic passion and attention flees- or at least seems greatly diminished- where social obligations reign. A great majority of times it seems conventional existence is structured to wage war on on the aesthetic heart- "busy, busy, busy" ... "worry, worry, worry" become its mantra, and we seem hypnotized by it to the point that we literally don't take the time out to stop and smell the roses.

On a purely superficial level it seems that Frost would at least have us aware of the conflict between our inherent desire to be one with beauty and the social constrains and obligations that tend to domesticate that desire. It's almost as if the poem has for its inner topic the conflict between freedom and necessity.

The poet's individual yields to that beauty- out of nowhere and just that moment- and takes in the "lovely, dark, and deep" which was laced with snow that was still falling. Necessity then impinged itself upon the moment and called this person's attention "back to reality" and away from beauty's transcendental sway. In the end the individual leaves that snowy encounter.

The point I derive from the poem is that, despite pressing obligations and social demands, we should step outside of our constraints occasionally and take in some of this beauty that surrounds us.

My Papa’s Waltz: Ambiguity in Poetry

Before reading the commentary, please read the poem first.

My Papa’s Waltz

The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy.

We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.

The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.

You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.

Of the Poem:

Ambiguity in poetry generally arises in three ways:
1. when we lack the context within which the poem was written
2. when we’re outside the vernacular of the poem or the poet
3. and, when we lack both the context of the poem along with its vernacular

My Papa’s Waltz is a strange poem to interpret. Its vernacular isn’t cryptic or remote, so it would seem any English reader could easily pick up the meaning it imparts. Its context, even if the poet hasn’t disclosed it to us elsewhere, essentially gives itself away. So the possibility of misunderstanding it, one would think, would be next to nonexistent.

That said, this poem has produced two schools of thought as to its meaning. On the one hand are those who believe the poem speaks of child abuse by an alcoholic father; on the other hand there are those who, while acknowledging the role alcohol plays, believe the poem to be a cherished childhood reflection of a boy waltzing with his dad who's slightly tipsy.

It is said by the latter group that the father may have been a kind of jolly drinker who comes home from work and (albeit clumsily) dances his boy to bed; the former group- citing examples from words like battered, knuckle, scraped, beat- think the poem clearly shows the father to be a mean drunk who rapaciously abuses his boy after a day of work.

Though seemingly simple, the poem does seem to contain a strong degree of ambiguity (otherwise this division of meaning wouldn't exist as it does). Looking at it under the microscope one can understand the arguments from both sides. One might even say- though I doubt the poet would- both sides are in a way correct.

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There seems little question that the poet speaks of himself. The use of past tense terminology (e.g. was not easy) seems to suggest 'presence' and reflection. Some of the details are too descriptive to not be actual memories (whiskey on your breath, battered on one knuckle, right ear scraped). These and other examples have led both schools of interpretation to the general conclusion that the boy in the poem is Roethke himself.

The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy

This doesn’t require much hermeneutic prowess; that the father had been drinking whiskey there’s no question. Both schools would agree. What they might disagree on is how much and how drunk the father was. Also, since this is where the division of interpretation seems to occur, there's the question of how the alcohol affected his mood.

But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy

The advocates of a more peaceful poem would say the boy ran to his father and gripped his leg as he walks in the house. The term ‘death’ does not need to be a negative one, it may resemble phrases such as: 'hugged to death', 'tickled to death', etc. Because the father staggers as the boy holds on, the boy says that this “waltzing was not easy” (in much the same way a rollercoaster ride isn’t easy). The advocates of this position tend to believe the term waltz is a simple euphemism for the father’s disequilibrium.

Those who see a more cruel aspect in the poem believe the father jerked his boy about, that the boy, off balance perhaps, “hung on like death” (where death implies the boy’s state of fear). Obviously such violent 'waltzing' wouldn't be easy for anyone. The advocates of this position tend to believe the term waltz is a euphemism for conflict, in much the same way that the phase ‘let’s dance’ might mean ' let's fight'.

We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.

Romping by definition is playing. Here the boy and his father carry on into the kitchen where some dishes are bumped into and, falling to the ground, provoke a mild annoyance in the mother’s looks. Then again, perhaps 'romp' is deliberately used as a poetic symbol, and the reason the pans fall and the reason the mother is frowning is precisely because the abuse and violence tears into the kitchen.

The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.

The third stanza is where the bulk of the said ‘violent images’ comes from. Terms like, held my wrist, battered, knuckle, ear scraped, buckle …. all these seem to indicate a violent struggle: the father grips the boy’s wrist to spank him with a belt; drunk, he looses his step and catches the boy with the belt’s buckle a few times. His battered hand? Perhaps from the struggle in the kitchen area?

Some say this is going overboard. Despite being slightly buzzed, the father dances lovingly with his boy. His battered hand? Perhaps from a half-stumble in the kitchen area? Perhaps from working? The point is that they’re dancing, and because the father keeps missing his beat (he’s buzzed remember) his buckle keeps bumping his son’s right ear.

You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.

The word ‘beat’ seems another violent potential. In fact, it would almost certainly mimic the escalation of a violent frenzy: The father grabs his boy about; the boy, clinging fearfully to the father’s shirt, is yanked around in the kitchen where dishes fall to the ground; next comes the belt (and inadvertently the belt's buckle) … finally, perhaps frustrated by his own disequilibrium, he discards the belt and takes up his hand, dragging the boy to his room (the boy still clinging fearfully to his father’s shirt). Sad, sad if true.

Again, some would blame that perspective for going overboard. It should be simple: The father comes home a little buzzed (not necessarily drunk, and certainly not mean); his boy runs and jumps and hug onto his leg; the father mimics a waltz perhaps, but being a little tipsy in the kitchen bumps some dishes to the ground (annoying mom and maybe battering a knuckle in the process); unable to maintain tempo he misses some steps which, as this happens, causes his belt buckle scratch his son’s ear; in his attempt to maintain tempo, the father pats the rhythm of the waltz on his son’s head (“you beat time on my head”), and literally waltzes his son to bed (the son lovingly still clinging to his shirt).

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Brief Note on Hermeneutics:

Traditional hermeneutics pertains to the art of interpretation and is usually reserved for, and applied to, sacred texts. In our contemporary world the term has found itself at home in linguistics and the philosophy of language, where the question of interpretation isn’t limited to scripture, but includes such things as broad spectrum language, sign language, and even body language. Martin Heidegger applies the term to life itself, and would have us understand that without an ‘existential hermeneutic’ (of reality) human understanding would itself be impossible.

The problem in hermeneutics as linguists know it is that interpreting anything correctly depends entirely on an agreed system of terms and symbols so that a mutual vernacular is established. Where this lacks ambiguity lurks. So when we come across a poem written by a poet long gone who hasn’t disclosed the context within which the poem was written, misinterpretations give way.

That’s what I find here. We lack the knowledge of the true event that produced this poem, and the poet can’t lend us an answer. We seem left with a beautiful (maybe tragic) work that asks: What am I? Had the terms (particularly, for me anyhow, the term ‘romp’) been explained to the letter I suspect the apparent dichotomy of it would hardly exist- but then again, what would have become of the poem as poetry.

I’d love to know what your perspective of the poem was when it was first read by you. Where did you fall in the dichotomy of it? If it would help to hear the poem read, click on the link below- it is Roethke himself who does the reading (note his mood and inflection as he reads his own poem).

My Papa's Waltz

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I’d like to acknowledge the New England Blog PoemShape for a great breakdown of My Papa's Waltz. Also, One Poet's Notes elaborates beautifully on this topic. Please, do check these blogs out.

Der Panther: A Rilke Poem

Imagine the height of happiness and freedom. Imagine living it, being it. Imagine that this blissful autonomy is all you‘ve known all your free and happy life. Then imagine crushing subjugation ending all of it in seconds. Would you not wish for freedom’s return; would you not pine away in melancholy at the loss of those former years? Here’s a question: Is it possible to forget it altogether?

Rilke’s Der Panther is a poem that wants to understand the mesmerizing strength of subjugation and the latent potency of freedom that lies within it. His example is drawn from the captivity of a large panther whose freedom, knowing no limit in a state of nature, is now next to nothing.

His poetic method was to behold things in the "silence of their concentrated reality." I imagine our poet standing before this cage, watching this large cat pace back and forth, back and forth … when suddenly the revelation: His freedom is dying in captivity. Then the poem:


The Panther*

His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world.

As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,
the movement of his powerful soft strides
is like a ritual dance around a center
in which a mighty will stands paralyzed.

Only at times, the curtain of the pupils
lifts, quietly--. An image enters in,
rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles,
plunges into the heart and is gone.

Of the Poem (Side Note):

Rilke, like so many other poets I’ve come to study, was heavily influenced by mysticism. He seems at times particularly existential (strange though that might be).

Sounding much like the German philosopher Martin Heidegger, who abhorred ‘existentialism’, Rilke sees the human mind as an opening through which reality is made manifest- indeed, through which reality has its own being! He seems to want to convey what his own poetic mind has known- but to whom? He says:

"Praise this world to the angel, not the unsayable one; you can't impress him with glorious emotion; in the universe where he feels more powerful, you are a novice. Show him something simple which, formed over generations, lives as our own, near our hand and within our gaze."**

In the 1990 movie ‘Awakening,’ Robert De Niro plays a patient suffering from a crippling state of catatonia- it’s so severe that he’s unable to move the smallest part of his body, unable even to speak. The patient, feeling his body a prison from which there was no escape, is likened to Rilke's Panther.

That scene and the superimposed narrative of these words left me in awe- “What an absolutely beautiful description of this patient’s malady,” I thought to myself.

This passage (at the time I didn’t realize it was a poem)- this passage and its powerful and penetrating way of expression has stayed with me to this day. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had formally been moved by poetry.

Perhaps this encounter is why Rainer Maria Rilke is one of my favorite poets. Perhaps it's the mystery I find in the man. Who knows for certain ... still, every time I read this poet I cannot but help think that he speaks to us of himself- especially here in this piece.


*View comments area for Der Panther in German
**Quote from Rilke's Duino Elegies