Demonstration 4: Structured Poetry

Robert Frost is one of the most beloved and critically-acclaimed American poets of the 20th century. One statement attributed to him is "Writing poetry without rhyme or meter is like playing tennis without a net", in reference to his contemporary e.e. cummings and other poets who experimented with the form. The structure in his poetry is more spoken than read, but has established rhythm. I am citing one of his most commonly anthologized pieces, "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.