Critical Appreciation of Birches

Critical Appreciation of Birches

The poem Birches is one that is an evidence of Frost’s love for nature. This poem is said to be one of the most popular poems of Robert Frost. Today we are going to discuss this poem in detail. Our main focus will be on summary and critical appreciation of Birches. Let’s read the critical appreciation of this popular poem by Robert Frost.

Summary of Birches

This poem belongs to The Mountain Interval published in 1916. It is also a very popular poem found in almost every anthology of Frost’s nature poems. There is a wonderful blend of subtle fact and fancy, observation and imagination here in this poem. Fact and fancy play together. It delights the mind and is endearing to the heart because wisdom and whimsy are combined here. The use of the blank verse is appropriate for the light—heartedness and seriousness of the themes dealt with. 

When birches bend to left and right, it seems to the poet that some boy has been swinging them. After a rain they are found loaded with ice, but they click upon themselves as the breeze rises. The stir “cracks and crazes” their enamel, and they turn many-colored. The crystal shells shatter and avalanche on the snow crust. 

Their quantity is such that you would think the inner dome of heaven had fallen. If they are bowed very low for long, they never right themselves; their trunks lie arching in the woods years afterwards, treating their leaves on the ground like girls on hands and knees throwing their hair before them over their heads to dry in the sun. 

The truth is that ice storms produce that condition for the birches. But the poet would prefer that some boy “too far from town to learn baseball,” played with the birches and “subdued” them (their father’s trees) by riding them down over and over again. He took the stiffness out of them by doing so. He conquered them all one by one. 

The poet himself was once such a boy — a swinger of birches. Now he dreams of going back to being such a boy, especially when he is “weary of considerations,” and vexed by the problems of life. He wants to get away from earth for some time, and then come back to it and begin over. He does not want to stay away from the earth permanently; 

“Earth’s the right place for love”. He does not know any better place for that. He would like to go by climbing a birch tree, climb black’ branches up Snow-white trunk toward heaven till the tree could bear no more. Then it would dip its top and set him down again. That would be good both going and coming back. 

Critical Appreciation of Birches

Literally, the poem “Birches” is a description of the birch trees found abundant in New England, and how boys play with its branches. 

When birches bend to the left and right, it seems that some boy has been swinging them. After a rain they are loaded with ice, but they click upon themselves as the breeze rises. The sun’s warmth melts the ice and crystal shells fall to the ground making a huge heap of ice. When a huge amount of ice bends the branches almost to the ground, the trees look like a girl on all fours, her hair hanging around from her head. 

But the poet wishes that some boy might play with the birches, getting to the top, bending the branches, and then jumping to the ground with perfect poise. The poet himself had been, as a boy, the swinger of branches. Sometimes he wanted to go away from it, but returned to it, as to the earth. He thinks earth is the “right place for love”, and it is good both going and coming back. 

On a metaphorical level, the poem can be studied as a symbolic presentation of the game of life. Life should have high aspirations, and if sometimes frustrations come on one’s way towards achieving such aspirations, and one feels like giving up, that should be momentary. He should come back to life, to the earth, because earth is the best place for love. Living without aspirations would be 8 worse things than getting momentary frustrations in the way towards achievement. 

The poem presents, with candour and intensity, the predicament of the modern man. He is seized with frustrations, anxiety, despair, and disillusionment, sometimes on his way towards fulfilment of his aspirations. But he should not give up his efforts. He should begin over and over again. 

The poem is a lyric in the sense that it expresses the poet’s feelings and ideas through the medium of the birch trees. It is without any stanzas. It is written in blank verse, with variations in meter very frequently. 

It’s whén/ Im wéar/y of/ considerations, 

And life/ is too/ much like/ a pathless wood 

Let us find the meter in these two lines. The first line is iambic pentameter, with a variation in the last foot which is an amphibrach, but the second line is a regular iambic pentameter. iambic pentameter is also known as the heroic verse, because it is used mainly in the epic poems, or poems of important adventure. It gives importance and weight to the theme, and at the same time, allows great flexibility in the handling of the verse. 

Frost has appropriately used this blank verse in the poem, for his theme is important: it is how to fight life’s battles, and achieve balance and stability by conquering them. As is usual with Frost, the language is simple and almost like everyday speech. The words used are perfectly within the vocabulary of an ordinary English-speaking man. But under this simplicity lies the depth of the poet’s philosophy of life. 

The sound devices used for creating melody necessary for a lyric are mostly consonance and dissonance, and alliteration. Images used are quite effective for the poet’s purpose: the birch trees, the farm boy, the ice, and the girl baby on all fours.

Conclusion

Considering all the factors we can conclude that this is a very successful poem. That was all about the critical appreciation of the poem Birches. I also try to summarize this poem in short. I hope all help you in many ways. There are some more articles on literature on our website. You may read them.