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Language, Literature, Learning & Life.




Poetry as Punishment?

Awhile back, some kids had a party and trashed the Frost House. Now, they've been assigned to take a class in Frost's poetry.
I suppose the impulse is good, but

Frost is one of those poets whose work seems "simple" at first glance, but with further thought, insight, and contemplation, the poems begin to open up facets of meanings--more than mere simple description, although that, too.

Try reading some for yourself. Here's a nice linked collection of some of Frost's work.
For Once, Then, Something

Others taught me with having knelt at well-curbs
Always wrong to the light, so never seeing
Deeper down in the well than where the water
Gives me back in a shining surface picture
Me myself in the summer heaven godlike
Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs.
Once, when trying with chin against a well-curb,
I discerned, as I thought, beyond the picture,
Through the picture, a something white, uncertain,
Something more of the depths--and then I lost it.
Water came to rebuke the too clear water.
One drop fell from a fern, and lo, a ripple
Shook whatever it was lay there at bottom,
Blurred it, blotted it out. What was that whiteness?
Truth? A pebble of quartz? For once, then, something.

Thanks to: Robert Frost page

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