Rashida Moore Post 1

In Robert Frost’s, “The Road Not Taken”, the traveler in this poem can represent a person who dares to take a path that is less frequented. On a certain level, this traveler can represent every man; thoughtfully weighing his options on which path to take. He can also represent a select few people who often take a less popular route in life. Each human being has to make decisions. Many of life’s decision are simple: what to wear or when to wake up. At the same, decision making can be very difficult, life altering choices, like this traveler’s decision was in the poem.

I believe that the beauty in this poem is that even in its simplistic tone and rhythm, heaviness is felt as a result of taking that less-traveled road. As we find in the last stanza, there was a tremendous weight in that decision because it had “made all the difference.”

I think that the author might be proposing that there may be something unique about this traveler because he chooses to take the second road. The poem states that he looked down the first path as far as he could see. Frost does not propose that there is anything wrong, bad, or foreboding about the first path, but as the traveler looked at the second path, it ignited an adventure or curiosity inside of him. That is what made him unique. He was interested to follow a different way, without knowing the outcome.

The first impression was that the result of his decision was positive, but the language does not explicitly state that the result of the taking the second road led to a happy conclusion at the end of the traveler’s life or journey. What we can infer is that the decision was permanent- there was no turning back. As the speaker concludes his story, he does so with a sigh when recalling this turning point in his life. The sigh could be one of relief or of regret or pain.

The ambiguity of the result of the traveler’s life is an important aspect of the poem. Even more important than knowing the outcome, I believe that the author is trying to bring up the point that in life there are turning points and decisions, and the outcome is never certain. In your human capacity one can see as far as possible, but everything else is left to discover.