The Road Not Taken

 

Ah, Robert Frost and “The Road Not Taken.”

The most famous line, ‘…I took the one less traveled by…,’ or did he? David Orr, in The Paris Review (see link below), says it’s the most misread poem - really? After reading, click on the link to see why he says this. Then reread it and ask yourself, if this poem is about individual choice or not choosing.

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 far 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.

 

~ by Robert Frost - 1915

 Photo Courtesy of Caleb Jones

"Most Misread Poem in America"