metaphors in the poem the road not taken by robert frost?

Answer 1

From: http://poetrypages.lemon8.nl/life/roadnottaken/roadnottaken.htm

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.

Copyright © 1962, 1967, 1970
by Leslie Frost Ballantine.

"When you arrive at a fork in the road, take it."
- Yogi Berra

Robert Frost on his own poetry:
"One stanza of 'The Road Not Taken' was written while I was sitting on a sofa in the middle of England: Was found three or four years later, and I couldn't bear not to finish it. I wasn't thinking about myself there, but about a friend who had gone off to war, a person who, whichever road he went, would be sorry he didn't go the other. He was hard on himself that way."
Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, 23 Aug. 1953
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ABOUT THIS POEM:

meaning:
The literal meaning of this poem by Robert Frost is pretty obvious. A traveler comes to a fork in the road and needs to decide which way to go to continue his journey. After much mental debate, the traveler picks the road "less traveled by."
The figurative meaning is not too hidden either. The poem describes the tuogh choices people stand for when traveling the road of life. The words "sorry" and "sigh" make the tone of poem somewhat gloomy. The traveler regrets leaves the possibilities of the road not chosen behind. He realizes he probably won't pass this way again.

devices:
There are plenty literary devices in this poem to be discovered. One of these is antithesis. When the traveler comes to the fork in the road, he wishes he could travel both. Within the current theories of our physical world, this is a non possibility (unless he has a split personality). The traveler realizes this and immediately rejects the idea.
Yet another little contradiction are two remarks in the second stanza about the road less traveled. First it's described as grassy and wanting wear, after which he turns to say the roads are actually worn about the same (perhaps the road less traveled makes travelers turn back?).

personification:
All sensible people know that roads don't think, and therefore don't want. They can't. But the description of the road wanting wear is an example of personification in this poem. A road actually wanting some as a person would. However: some believe this to be incorrect and believe "wanting wear" is not a personification, but rather older English meaning "lacking". So it would be "Because it was grassy and lacked wear;".

Answer 2

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Look up the poem one more time. In the second line of stanza 3, you have "feet" where Frost wrote "step." I don't see much in the way of simile, metaphor, or personification in the poem. But "ages and ages" in the final stanza looks like an example of hyperbole. Human beings don't really live for ages and ages. At most, the speaker might be "telling this with a sigh" a few decades hence. (The last line of the poem could be another example of hyperbole. Can a decision about which path to take while walking in the woods really make "all the difference" in the rest of a person's life?) The phrase "a yellow wood" in the first line of the poem might be an example of synecdoche (you can look it up if you're not familiar with that term). The speaker can't be walking through a forest in which everything is yellow. Clearly, it's autumn, and the leaves that remain on the trees are yellow, as well as the leaves that have fallen to the ground and have not yet been trodden black. So when the poet calls the wood "yellow," he's using one element of the scene, the leaves, to stand for the whole wood.

Answer 3

I had a youth leader who really felt a connection to this poem. Her education was in journalism, she wanted to be a news writer. Instead, she got married and raised 4 daughters and a son. Being a mom and a wife and a homemaker isn't as common, as popular as it was back in the day (50s).

But she felt that this "road less traveled by" was hers. Sure, after her kids were raised, she could go back and write for the paper, but it wouldn't be the same as if she'd done it when she was younger. She's glad that she raised her children, though- it's made all the difference in her life.

Answer 4

sorry I can't see figurative language in this poem