thericechronicles: The Road Not Taken

Saturday, April 9, 2016

The Road Not Taken

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.

From Wikipedia: "The Road Not Taken" is a narrative poem consisting of four stanzas of 5 lines each in iambic tetrameter (though it is hypermetric by one beat – there are nine syllables per line instead of the strict eight required for tetrameter) and is one of Frost's most popular works. Besides being among the best known poems, some claim that it is one of the most misunderstood.[3]

Frost's biographer Lawrance Thompson is cited as saying that the poem's narrator is "one who habitually wastes energy in regretting any choice made: belatedly but wistfully he sighs over the attractive alternative rejected."[4] According to the Thompson biography, Robert Frost: The Years of Triumph (1971), in his introduction in readings to the public, Frost would say that the speaker was based on his friend Edward Thomas. In Frost’s words, Thomas was “a person who, whichever road he went, would be sorry he didn’t go the other.[5]

While a case could be made for the sigh being one of satisfaction, the critical 'regret' analysis supports the interpretation that this poem is about the human tendency to look back and attribute blame to minor events in one's life, or to attribute more meaning to things than they may deserve.[6] In 1961, Frost commented that “The Road Not Taken” is “a tricky poem, very tricky” implying that people generally misinterpret this poem as evidence of the benefit of free thinking and not following the crowd, while Frost’s intention was to comment about indecision and people finding meaning in inconsequential decisions.[7] A New York Times Sunday book review on Brian Hall's 2008 biography Fall of Frost states: "Whichever way they go, they’re sure to miss something good on the other path.”[8]

From Dirk: I believe God gives us opportunities daily to choose to do things His Way or not. In other words go down God's road or not. My biggest regrets in life are when I choose to go down the road that He doesn't want me to go on. ie: anger, hate, lust, greed, pettiness, grudge holding, ungratefulness, meanness etc, you get the picture. Whereas when I choose to go down the road God has before me, even though I really, really, really, don't want to go down there, when I do, it has always made the difference for good. Often God's road is the one less travelled by, ie visiting orphanages, visiting homeless people, not reacting to situations in anger, but going on it always makes a difference for good. The road of selfishness, self serving, self righteous indignation only brings grief in the end. Sadly that road is basically a well used highway to hell. Go on God's road, the road of no regrets! End station: HEAVEN!

Below are a few roads in Hong Kong that I am sure will be in heaven as well.