Robert Frost’s “Birches” is one of the most widely appreciated poems. It is a fine example of the poet’s power to fuse observation and imagination. Frost belongs to the pastoral tradition. Most of his poems reveal the beautiful countryside of New England. They also express the national spirit of America. If his poems are closely read, they can be seen as philosophical, as they touch upon the complexities of life. This paper is an analysis of the poem, “Birches”, to highlight the delight and wisdom it radiates.
The poet one day sees some birches bend to left and right and they evoke in him nostalgic memories of his childhood. He thinks that some boys must have done it. However, immediately he realizes that the boys cannot bend them the way they are: “swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay/ Ice storms do that” (Frost). Therefore, the only possibility is a heavy ice storm. Frost then observes the ice blocks lying trapped on the trees. Such blocks get melted away as the sun warms up and they fall down cracking into pieces: “Such heaps of broken glass sweep away” (Frost). The broken pieces are then swept away by the wind. The trees cannot straighten themselves easily after such an event. They remain in that arched position for years.
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The most beautiful description in the poem is the comparison made by the poet between the sight of the arched trees and that of some beautiful girls drying their hair in the sun. The trees “trailing their leaves on the ground” are compared to the “girls on their hands and knees that throw their hair” (Frost). The sunlight after a rain, the broken ice pieces, the birches lying bent and the soft breeze blowing bring memories of his early days. The poet wants to link this enchanting sight with his favorite leisure time activities in his childhood, but the “Truth broke in”, the truth of the ice storms bending the trees.
The poet, therefore, returns to his earlier statement: “I should prefer to have some boy bend them”. He recollects the sight of the boys in New England going out to fetch the cows, and as they find the birch trees, they swing and bend them down. “By riding them over and over again”, they take away the stiffness of the trees. The boys ensure that not even one tree is left unconquered. What is great about this game is that the poet is able to learn a great deal from it about life. He learns the art of going up and coming down, and not simply going up alone. The boys, like the poet, also learn how to balance themselves after reaching the top of the birches. The game has so delighted the poet that he compares the climbing to the care one gives in filling up a cup. It is like “filling above the brim” (Frost). After reaching the top of the trees the boys fling outward, “kicking his way down through the air to the ground” (Frost). As the poet was once himself a swinger of birches, he knows the pleasure of swinging. One reason why he wants to go back to those good old days is that the present life is full of problems.
Suddenly the poet becomes conscious of the hard reality of life. In this “pathless wood”, he says, “your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs/ Broken across it” (Frost). Therefore, the trees give him an escape route, to go away from the hard reality. However, he does not want to be mistaken. The most important part of the poem is when the poet says that he wants to go up “And then come back to it and begin again” (Frost). He realizes that God may hear only half of his prayer and he may be denied of his desire to come down, he may be “snatched away/ Not to return” (Frost). Therefore, he not only makes corrections but also asserts that “Earth’s is the right place for love: / I don’t know where it is likely to go better” (Frost). This is taken as an example to show how robust an optimist Frost is.
Once again the poet makes his position clear. He says he would like to climb the birch trees. He likes climbing up and up the trees that point toward heaven. When the trees cannot bear him anymore, he will dip down to reach back to the ground. This will enable him both, the pleasure of going up and coming down. This is the greatness of swinging birch trees. One can experience the pleasure of both heaven and earth.
A Frostian poem begins with a clear and concrete situation which is taken from the life of an ordinary man. It gives great delight to the reader, but gradually he is forced to a philosophic speculation. The poem also brings out man’s relationship with nature. Frost does not exaggerate the situation, but he is fond of understatements. Beneath the simplicity of his poems, like “Birches”, lies the complexity of life. This is very much evident in this poem. Initially he invites the readers to see the beauty of nature, the bent birch trees after a storm. Then he moves on to his main task of inducing insight by asserting that earth is the right place to love.
The poem, thus, is a reminder to those who feel that happiness can be found only after this life, in heaven. Even if one tries to soar in his imagination towards some fantastic world, he must come back, like the birch swingers, to this earth. “Birches”, therefore, is a very optimistic poem. Without making it a prosaic verse, Frost has managed the blank verse in the poem beautifully. He has beautifully mingled wisdom and fancy in this poem. It is light, serious, reminiscent, realistic, and he has beautifully blended in it fun and thought. It has been well accepted not only by the readers but also by the scholars and the academicians. It is taught in classrooms all over the world.
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