“Birches” Introduction

• Robert Frost wrote "Birches" between 1913 and 1914, eventually publishing it in The Atlantic Monthly's August issue in 1915. The poem was later included in Frost's third collection of poetry, Mountain Interval. Consisting of 59 lines of blank verse, the poem features a speaker who likes to imagine that the reason ice-covered birch trees are stooped is that a young boy has been climbing them and swinging to the ground while holding onto the flexible treetops. This, it eventually becomes clear, is something the speaker once did as a child, and this turns the poem into a nostalgic celebration of youthful joy while also juxtaposing childish spontaneity with the more serious, mundane realities of adulthood.

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“Birches” Summary

• Whenever the speaker sees stooped birch trees, which stand out against the surrounding upright trees, the speaker likes to imagine that they're bent this way because a young boy has been holding onto their thin upper branches and then, with the flexible trees in hand, swinging to the ground. That said, the speaker knows that swinging from the trees doesn't actually cause them to stay bent down the way ice-storms do.

  Most people, the speaker posits, have seen birch trees covered in ice on bright mornings after a winter's rain. Birches like this scratch against one another in the wind, the ice around the branches glinting as it begins to crack. Before long, the sun heats up the ice-covered branches and causes the fine layers of ice to fall, breaking across the hard crust that the snow has created on the ground. Falling and breaking like this creates so many shards of ice that one might think some kind of sphere in heaven has shattered and fallen to earth. The birches get so weighted down by the ice that they sink to the level of scraggly, unhealthy ferns. They never break under this strain, though they also never return to their previous height after having been bent for so long. This is why passerby will notice such trees curving toward the ground for years after they've been bent, their leaves hanging down in the same way that hair might drape from the heads of young girls when they toss it forward while on their hands and knees, leaving it to hang like that as it dries in the sun.

  At this point, the speaker returns to the original focus of the poem, having gotten wrapped up in describing the effect of ice storms. Originally, the speaker meant to say that it's preferable to imagine that a boy bent the birch trees by swinging from them on his way to tend to his family's cows. This boy, the speaker imagines, lived too deep in the woods to play baseball in town, and instead had to find his own source of entertainment, amusing himself all through the year. Gradually, the boy bent all the birches on his father's property by swinging from their tops, which made the trees flexible and droopy. He did this so much, in fact, that there weren't any birches in the area that hadn't succumbed to him.

  The boy learned how to safely swing from the birch trees, learning that it's important to not jump before reaching the part where the trunk is most flexible, since otherwise the tree could snap and fall quickly to the ground. The boy maintained his composure as he climbed all the way up to the highest branches, moving with the same care one might use when slowly filling a cup to the very top or even just beyond the top. Then, when he reached the top of the tree, he jumped out and swung his legs gracefully through the air as he gradually sailed to the ground.

  The speaker used to be the kind of boy who swung from birch trees like this, and now fantasizes about one day swinging from the birches again. This fantasy crops up when the speaker becomes overwhelmed by the details and frustrations of everyday life—an experience that is like trying to navigate through a stretch of woods without any kind of trail, as trees and spider webs assault the speaker's face, which gets scratched by a small stick that cuts across the eye.

  The speaker says that it would be nice to escape earth for a bit and then, after a little while, return and start all over again. This is not to say that the speaker wants some kind of omniscient being to misinterpret and partially fulfill this wish by taking the speaker away from earth for good without any chance of return. The speaker believes that earth is the only place to fully enjoy things like love, and there's no other place where things might be better than they are here. The speaker wants to die by climbing a birch tree, scaling its dark branches and its snow-covered trunk in the direction of heaven, until the speaker got so high that the tree could no longer support the weight and slowly bent over to place the speaker back on the ground. This feeling of escaping earth while also returning to it, the speaker says, would be very nice. There are worse things than being someone who swings from birch trees.

“Birches” Themes

• 

  The Joy of Childhood

  “Birches” explores children's ability to find joy and wonder in everyday life. The speaker contemplates ice-covered birch trees that have stooped to the ground, imagining that they’re bent because a young boy has been climbing them, jumping off while holding their thin uppermost branches and then drifting slowly back to the ground. This, the speaker imagines, is what the young boy does to entertain himself when he’s on his way to care for his family’s cows—a task that would otherwise probably be boring and mundane. In this way the poem becomes a celebration of youthful spontaneity and joy—qualities that the poem implies are no better embodied than by imaginative, care-free children.

  The speaker particularly admires how children are able to find ways of having fun even when they’re in seemingly boring circumstances. For example, the speaker imagines that the boy swinging from the trees lives too far from town to play baseball, meaning that he’s left to his own devices to keep himself entertained. This, however, doesn’t stop the boy from fully enjoying life. Instead of mindlessly completing his chores, the boy finds an inventive way of harnessing joy, turning to his surroundings and finding a way to thrill himself by swinging from the trees. This childlike ability to squeeze happiness and excitement out of life, the speaker implies, is a marvelous thing.

  What’s more, the speaker subtly suggests that these kinds of life experiences aren’t just fun, but important parts of the coming of age process. “He learned all there was / To learn about not launching out too soon,” the speaker says, suggesting that the boy knows not to jump before reaching the flexible part of the tree, since this might cause the tree to snap when he jumps, thus sending him plummeting to the ground.

  On a broader level, this teaches the boy how to seek excitement and thrills safely—especially since the idea of “not launching out too soon” can be applied to many areas of life, ultimately emphasizing the importance of patience and thinking things through. In turn, the speaker applauds children’s ability to enjoy life while also insinuating that this process of having fun is an essential part of growing up, since it informs the way children learn to navigate adulthood.

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• 

  The Tedious Reality of Adulthood

  The speaker frames adulthood as mundane, stressful, and bogged down by boring details and responsibilities. This is why the speaker covets the imaginative period of childhood, when it is easier to ignore the drudgery of everyday life in favor of a more inspired, fun-loving outlook. In turn, the speaker implies that the humdrum realities of adult life chip away at people until they no longer stop to enjoy the world in creative, spontaneous ways.

  Even though the speaker knows that the birch trees are bent because they’re covered in ice, the speaker prefers to think that a boy has been swinging through them and causing them to droop. This, in turn, is a sign that the speaker is nostalgic for childhood and wants to ignore the boring details of everyday life. The speaker is well aware that a boy “swinging” from the trees wouldn’t actually “bend” the wood in this way, yet still says, “I should prefer to have some boy bend them,” revealing an intentional effort to deny reality. The speaker demonstrates a desire to view the world with excitement and wonder instead of always thinking logically.

  Of course, it’s not always so easy for the speaker to view the world this way. Indeed, the speaker wants to imagine a child swinging through the trees, but ends up launching into an extensive account of how ice builds up on branches. The speaker describes this as “Truth br[eaking] in” and interfering with this fantasy, an idea that shows how hard it is to prioritize imagination over reality as an adult.

  This, then, suggests that the speaker is literally unable to ignore reality in favor of a more exciting, whimsical worldview, especially since it isn’t until after this long-winded description of icy branches that the speaker finally imagines a cheerful child having fun in the woods. Consequently, readers see that even the speaker—who actively wants to escape the boring details of the real world—feels the pull of logic and reason, which distracts from more fun, imaginative perspectives.

  Nonetheless, the speaker hopes to somehow regain a lighthearted and creative worldview. With this in mind, the speaker “dream[s] of going back to be” the kind of person who swings through trees. However, something is standing in the way: the boring but inarguable facts of reality. In keeping with this, the speaker is most likely inhibited by old age, since it’s undeniably hard for frail old people to shimmy up trees.

  What’s more, there seems to be some kind of emotional block keeping the speaker from acting spontaneously—perhaps because adulthood has stamped out the speaker’s will to seek out thrills or childish delights. Either way, what’s clear is that adulthood has changed the way the speaker moves through the world, making it harder to set aside practical “considerations” in favor of excitement, joy, or pleasure.

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• 

  Death, Spirituality, and Escape

  In some ways, the speaker appears ready to embrace death, expressing a certain willingness to leave life behind. And yet, the speaker also rejects the theoretical allure of heaven in favor of the pull of earthly life. It becomes clear that the speaker longs to experience the transcendent feeling of escape that death would provide, but doesn’t ultimately want to give up the pleasures of being alive—and with it, the possibility of again experiencing love, wonder, and joy.

  The speaker uses simple metaphorical imagery to illustrate the desire to escape life as it is. Throughout the poem, the speaker talks about a young boy climbing birch trees and then sailing to the ground after reaching the flexible treetops. For the most part, the speaker talks about this in order to demonstrate the extent to which children are capable of finding joy in life. However, the idea of climbing a tree only to be set back down on the ground after reaching the top is also a metaphor for the desire to get away from the speaker’s own current existence while also knowing that this escape will not be permanent.

  In keeping with this, the speaker says that it would be nice, to “get away from earth for awhile.” This suggests that the speaker wouldn’t mind being removed from everyday life, which has perhaps become monotonous and unrewarding in the speaker’s old age.

  However, the speaker apparently has no interest in leaving life behind in favor of an afterlife, as evidenced by the fact that the speaker only wants to climb “toward heaven”—not actually to heaven. As such, it’s clear that the speaker wants the cathartic and liberating feeling of escaping adult life but is completely uninterested in any kind of true death or religious transcendence, since this would mean permanently giving up earthly existence—something the speaker has no intention of doing.

  After all, the speaker thinks that life on earth is worth sticking around for, saying, “Earth’s the right place for love: / I don’t know where it’s likely to go better.” Although the poem doesn’t focus on love, this assertion showcases the speaker’s belief that earthly life is full of good things like love that are worth living for, even when one yearns to leave other aspects of life behind. What the speaker is after, then, isn’t death, but the opportunity to get some distance from the drudgery of life so that the beautiful parts of existence—like love or childish wonder—can be experienced anew. “That would be good both going and coming back,” the speaker says, confirming the impulse to both leave life behind and regain it—a dynamic exemplified by a flexible birch tree’s ability to give one the satisfaction of climbing and descending at the same time.

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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Birches”

• Lines 1-5

  When I see birches bend to left and right
  Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
  I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
  But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay
  As ice-storms do.

  The poem begins with the simple image of bent birch trees, which stoop toward the ground and create a stark juxtaposition with the other surrounding trees that stand straight and tall. Right away, this contrast takes on symbolic meaning: those "straighter darker trees" represent normality and the boring nature of everyday life, whereas the bent birch trees represent (at least in the speaker's mind) something more interesting and exciting (an admittedly vague idea that will become clearer as the poem proceeds).

  To that end, the speaker goes on to say, "I like to think some boy's been swinging them." By saying this, the speaker reveals a desire to view the surrounding environment with a sense of intrigue. Rather than glancing at the bent trees and quickly moving on, the speaker creates an interesting backstory for why they're stooped like this. This, in turn, suggests that the speaker is an imaginative person who looks for evidence of joy and childish excitement in the world.

  However, the speaker also acknowledges that the act of swinging from birch trees wouldn't actually make the trees look bent in the way they do now. Rather, "ice-storms" are what cause the trees to stoop like this. By pointing this out, the speaker reveals an awareness of reality—an awareness that ultimately interferes with the more fun, delightful idea of a young boy swinging through the trees. In this moment, then, a tension arises between the speaker's attempt to view the world with the imaginative, curious eyes of a child and the speaker's inability to ignore the much more boring and mundane details of reality.

  These opening lines also establish the speaker's use of iambic pentameter, a meter in which each line contains five iambs (metrical feet consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, creating a da-DUM da-DUM rhythm). Consider, for example, the first two lines:

  When I | see birch- | es bend | to left | and right,
  Across | the lines | of straight- | er dark- | er trees

  The iambic rhythm of these lines sounds bouncy and consistent, giving the poem's opening a feeling of predictability that is also musical and somewhat lulling—a dynamic that reflects the speaker's contemplative mood.

  The first line also features the alliteration of the /b/ sound, which appears in the words "birches" and "bends." This /b/ sound also returns in lines 3 and 4, when the speaker says:

  I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
  But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay

  This use of alliteration gives the lines a strong, rounded sound that is balanced by the softness of sibilant sounds like the /z/ and /s/ sounds, which appear throughout this section:

  When I see birches bend to left and right
  Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
  I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
  But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay
  As ice-storms do. [...]

  The softness of these sibilant sounds gives the speaker's language a smooth, flowing feel. This sibilance might even subtly evoke the sound of branches swishing in the wind.

• Lines 5-11

  Often you must have seen them
  Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
  After a rain. They click upon themselves
  As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
  As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
  Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
  Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust—

  

  

• Lines 12-16

  Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
  You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
  They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
  And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
  So low for long, they never right themselves:

  

  

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• Lines 17-20

  You may see their trunks arching in the woods
  Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
  Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
  Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.

  

  

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• Lines 21-27

  But I was going to say when Truth broke in
  With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm
  I should prefer to have some boy bend them
  As he went out and in to fetch the cows—
  Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
  Whose only play was what he found himself,
  Summer or winter, and could play alone.

  

  

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• Lines 28-32

  One by one he subdued his father's trees
  By riding them down over and over again
  Until he took the stiffness out of them,
  And not one but hung limp, not one was left
  For him to conquer.

  

  

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• Lines 32-40

  He learned all there was
  To learn about not launching out too soon
  And so not carrying the tree away
  Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
  To the top branches, climbing carefully
  With the same pains you use to fill a cup
  Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
  Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
  Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.

  

  

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• Lines 41-47

  So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
  And so I dream of going back to be.
  It's when I'm weary of considerations,
  And life is too much like a pathless wood
  Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
  Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
  From a twig's having lashed across it open.

  

  

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• Lines 48-52

  I'd like to get away from earth awhile
  And then come back to it and begin over.
  May no fate willfully misunderstand me
  And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
  Not to return.

  

  

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• Lines 52-56

  Earth's the right place for love:
  I don't know where it's likely to go better.
  I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
  And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
  Toward
   heaven,

  

  

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• Lines 56-59

  till the tree could bear no more,
  But dipped its top and set me down again.
  That would be good both going and coming back.
  One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

  

  

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“Birches” Symbols

• 

  Swinging from Birch Trees

  The poem centers around the act of swinging from birch trees—an act that symbolizes the youthful ability to find joy and excitement in seemingly ordinary, unremarkable circumstances.

  This ability to seek out joy is a gift that adults have trouble embracing, as evidenced by the fact that the speaker—who actively tries to resist the boring details of everyday life—goes on a long rant about the real reason the birches have stooped, talking extensively about ice building up on the branches. That the speaker has trouble even just imagining a boy swinging from the birches suggests that the many "considerations" of everyday life make it hard for adults to move through the world with the same kind of wonder and excitement as fun-loving children.

  The act of climbing and swinging from birch trees not only stands for youthful joy, but also the speaker's desire to recapture that joy. "So was I once myself a swinger of birches," the speaker says. "And so I dream of going back to be." In turn, readers see that the speaker views such behavior as a way to reignite a sense of spontaneity and happiness that unfortunately, the poem implies, diminishes as people grow older. In other words, climbing birch trees is a way to escape the tedium of adult life, therefore representing the speaker's desire to transcend ordinary, unimaginative circumstances.

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“Birches” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Alliteration

  The speaker uses alliteration in small moments to enhance the sound of the poem's language. For example, take the first line, when the speaker alliterates the loud /b/ sound:

  When I see birches bend to left and right

  This moment of alliteration creates a strong but somewhat staccato or choppy rhythm. In turn, the alliteration accentuates the poem's meter, since both of the prominent /b/ sounds land on stressed syllables, thereby strengthening and establishing the iambic rhythm (da-DUM da-DUM) that will run through the rest of the poem. It also simply draws attention to the poem's most important image: that of the bent birch trees, weighed down by the leftovers of an ice storm.

  The alliterative /b/ sound repeats in lines 3 and 4, where the speaker also uses an alliterative /d/ sound in line 4:

  I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
  But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay

  These voiced consonants add texture and heaviness to the poem in this moment, subtly evoking the weighty bending of the birches themselves.

  In other moments, alliteration adds a sense of lightness to the poem's lines. This is the case in lines 24 and 25, when the speaker layers the gentle /f/ and quick /t/ sounds:

  As he went out and in to fetch the cows–
  Some boy too far from town to learn baseball

  This lively alliteration reflects the vivacity and curiosity of the boy being described. It also creates a varied and fresh sound, which keeps the speaker's language from sounding dull and predictable—something that is especially important in a poem like "Birches," which is nearly 60 lines long!

  In another striking example of alliteration, the speaker turns to the hard /c/ sound to again evoke the imagery at hand:

  As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
  As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel

  Here, the harsh alliteration mimics the "crack[ing]" sound the ice-covered trees make as they, ever so slowly, begin melt in the sun. The /cr/ sound of "cracks and crazes" then echoes throughout the following lines with "crystal" and "crust," subtly imbuing the poem with the crackling sound of the trees.

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• Consonance

  

  
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• Assonance

  

  

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• Metaphor

  

  

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• Personification

  

  

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• Caesura

  

  

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• Juxtaposition

  

  

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• Sibilance

  

  

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• Simile

  

  

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• Repetition

  

  

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"Birches" Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Birches
• Many-colored
• Stir
• Crazes
• Enamel
• Snow-crust
• Heaps
• The inner dome of heaven
• Withered
• Bracken
• Load
• Bowed
• Subdued
• Poise
• Brim
• Pathless wood
• Willfully
• Half grant

• A thin kind of tree that tends to grow in northern regions. Many birch trees have tops that are so flexible that a person can pull them all the way to the ground without breaking the trunk.

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Birches”

• Form

  "Birches" doesn't adhere to a conventional poetic form. Rather, it is a straightforward poem consisting of 59 lines. There are no stanza breaks, nor is there a set rhyme scheme.

  Given that the poem's language is fairly straightforward and conversational, it makes sense that it doesn't follow a specific poetic structure. Instead, the poem presents itself simply, allowing the speaker's nostalgic thoughts to unfold in an unadorned way, like someone simply telling a story.

• Meter

  The poem is written in blank verse, a.k.a. unrhymed iambic pentameter. This means that each line contains five iambs, which are metrical feet consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (da-DUM). Take, for example, the first two lines:

  When I | see birch- | -es bend | to left | and right
  Across | the lines | of straight- | er dark- | er trees

  There is a very strong iambic rhythm in these opening lines, giving the speaker's language a bouncy and consistent sound. This, in turn, establishes the pacing of the rest of the poem.

  However, the speaker only uses iambic pentameter as a rough template upon which to base the poem's rhythm. Rather than strictly following this metrical pattern, the speaker often plays with the rhythm by using non-iambic feet. Consider, for instance, line 20:

  Before | them ov- | er their heads | to dry | in the sun.

  Instead of using five iambs in this line, the speaker varies the rhythm by using two anapests, which are metrical feet consisting of two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable (da-da-DUM). The line's third foot ("-er their heads") and final foot ("in the sun") are both anapests, which subtly disrupt the iambic rhythm. This, in turn, enlivens the pacing of the poem, adding a certain sense of unpredictability that makes the poem's flow feel somewhat exciting.

  Similarly, the speaker sometimes uses extra syllables. For example, the last line of the poem has a sixth foot (meaning that this line is actually in iambic hexameter):

  One could | do worse | than be | a swing- | er of | birches.

  (Note that "One could" might also be read as a trochee, stressed-unstressed; "One could".) Interestingly enough, this exact thing happens several times throughout the poem. This has the effect of making the poem sound ever so slightly disjointed without actually breaking away from the predominant rhythmic pattern. Accordingly, the speaker's language sounds fresh and surprising in small ways that keep the poem from becoming monotonous.

• Rhyme Scheme

  "Birches" does not have a set rhyme scheme. And while there are several moments in which the speaker uses internal slant rhymes, even these instances are few and far between. In fact, there aren't any rhymes at all until line 12, when the speaker creates an internal slant rhyme between the word "heaps" and the word "sweep." Although this is a subtle rhyme, there are so few rhymes in the surrounding lines that it actually has a very noticeable effect, ultimately making line 12 sound particularly musical.

  On the whole, though, the poem's lack of rhyme aligns with its straightforward nature. Rather than centering around a rhyme scheme, the poem focuses on simply narrating the speaker's thoughts and emotions. And though the lines don't tend to rhyme with each other, the speaker still manages to achieve a sense of musicality through the poem's rhythm and through poetic devices like consonance and alliteration. The fact that there aren't many rhymes in "Birches" thus doesn't keep the poem from sounding melodic and satisfying.

“Birches” Speaker

• Many readers assume that the speaker is Robert Frost himself, an interpretation that aligns with the fact that Frost used to swing from birch trees as a youngster in New England. There isn't actually much identifying information in the poem itself when it comes to the speaker, however, apart from the fact that this is a person who lives near birch trees and winter snow.

  What is clear, though, is that the speaker of "Birches" is an adult who looks back on childhood with nostalgia, wishing it were possible to recapture the same sense of joy and adventure that children exhibit. More specifically, the speaker likes to imagine that a boy has been climbing nearby birch trees and riding them to the ground, even though the speaker knows that the trees are actually bent because they've been stooped by ice. This reveals the speaker's tendency to look beyond the surrounding circumstances in order to focus on more imaginative realities.

  It also eventually becomes clear that the speaker used to swing from birches as a child but no longer does this as an adult. This, in turn, suggests that adult life has stamped out the speaker's tendency to seek out childish joy, though the speaker hopes to one day become "a swinger of birches" again.

“Birches” Setting

• The poem takes place in a birch-filled forest during winter. The birches are bent, stooping toward the snowy ground due to the weight of the ice encasing their limbs. It's also fair to say that these woods are in a relatively remote area, since the boy the speaker imagines lives "too far from town" to join a local baseball team.

  More specifically, the poem likely takes place somewhere in New England. After all, birch trees tend to grow in northern areas, and Robert Frost himself lived in New England and used to swing from birches as a child.

Literary and Historical Context of “Birches”

• Literary Context

  Robert Frost worked on "Birches" from 1913 to 1914 and included it in his collection Mountain Interval, which was published in 1916. Frost's third book, Mountain Interval also features the famous poems "The Road Not Taken" and "Out, Out–" and as a whole marked an important moment in Frost's career. Indeed, poems like "Birches" and "The Road Not Taken" signaled a slight departure from his earlier poetry, which often took the form of dramatic monologues. By contrast, the poems in Mountain Interval were more meditative, often set in nature and drawing upon the naturalistic and philosophical themes that had already defined Frost's writing.

  The poems in Mountain Interval paved the way for poems like "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" and "New Hampshire," both of which Frost published in 1923. In all of these poems, Frost dwells upon rural landscapes and uses naturalistic imagery to evoke profound thoughts about the human condition. To a certain extent, this use of imagery aligns with the fact that Frost was loosely associated with the Imagist movement that took hold in 1912, as famous Imagists like Ezra Pound praised his work.

  However, Frost wasn't that influenced by his association to this particular branch of Modernism, instead focusing on his own project of developing what he called the "sound of sense"—a phrase he used to describe his efforts to capture meaning and significance through the sound of colloquial language.

  "Birches" was partially inspired by a poem called "Swinging on a Birch Tree" by the 19th-century poet Lucy Larcom. But whereas Larcom's poem is short, light, and cheerful, "Birches" is long, thoughtful, and somewhat melancholy, ultimately sharing more in common with the work of a poet like John Keats, whose poems did, in fact, influence Frost with their Romantic themes and contemplative tone.

  Historical Context

  Frost wrote "Birches" while living in England in the years before World War I. By the time it was published in the August 1915 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, though, the war had already been raging for a full year. During this time, Frost returned to the United States and bought property in New Hampshire, where he wrote and taught extensively.

  This history is notable not because the pre-war atmosphere crept into "Birches," but precisely because the poem lacks any acknowledgment of the war. This is significant because World War I hung heavily over poets at that time, challenging them to figure out how, exactly, to write about humanity in the midst of terrible violence.

  With this in mind, the slow and thoughtful tone displayed in "Birches" strikes an interesting chord, since the meditative and peaceful atmosphere of the poem is at odds with the fact that the world was erupting into chaos during its composition. Rather than focusing on political tensions and what felt like a jarring upheaval of order in the world, though, "Birches" centers around broader themes of nostalgia and joy, spotlighting fundamental aspects of the human condition instead of concerning itself with current events.

More “Birches” Resources

• External Resources

  • The Robert Frost Farm — Read about Robert Frost's legacy in New England – where he swung from birches as a boy—and the farm  that bears his name!

  • Robert Frost Reads "Birches" — Hear the poet himself read "Birches" in this old recording.

  • Birch Swinging — Check out this video of somebody demonstrating how to swing from a birch tree.

  • The Poet's Life — For more information about Robert Frost, take a look at this brief overview of his life and work. 

  • Frost and the "Sound of Sense" — Learn more about Frost's thoughts on "sound of sense," a term he used to describe the significance of sound in poetry, especially when applied to straightforward but impassioned language.

• LitCharts on Other Poems by Robert Frost

  • Acquainted with the Night

  • After Apple-Picking

  • A Roadside Stand

  • Desert Places

  • Design

  • Dust of Snow

  • Fire and Ice

  • Home Burial

  • Mending Wall

  • Mowing

  • My November Guest

  • Nothing Gold Can Stay

  • Nothing New

  • Out, Out—

  • Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

  • The Death of the Hired Man

  • The Oven Bird

  • The Road Not Taken

  • The Sound of the Trees

  • The Tuft of Flowers

  • The Wood-Pile