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Looking for a Sunset Bird in Winter
by Robert Frost
The west was getting out of gold,
The breath of air had died of cold,
When shoeing home across the white,
I thought I saw a bird alight.
In summer when I passed the place
I had to stop and lift my face;
A bird with an angelic gift
Was singing in it sweet and swift.
No bird was singing in it now.
A single leaf was on a bough,
And that was all there was to see
In going twice around the tree.
From my advantage on a hill
I judged that such a crystal chill
Was only adding frost to snow
As gilt to gold that wouldn’t show.
A brush had left a crooked stroke
Of what was either cloud or smoke
From north to south across the blue;
A piercing little star was through.
_________________________
One of the best poets of all time is Robert Frost, and much of that has to do with his ability to use language in a way that cultivates a sense of depth or mystery.
For example: “The west was getting out of gold” is an incredible way to say “the sun is setting” because it asks the Reader to question whether the poem is – in addition to its plainer meaning – a commentary on civilizational decline, a financial crisis, or something else. This first line alerts you to sift through his words the rest of the way.
Lets look a little more closely at the entire poem and do that sifting.
Stanza One
The west was getting out of gold,
The breath of air had died of cold,
When shoeing home across the white,
I thought I saw a bird alight.
On the surface, though the words chosen are poetic, Frost is setting a scene here. The sun is setting. It’s winter. He was walking home and thought he saw a bird. The rhyme scheme here is AABB and the meter is iambic tetrameter. Frost makes great use of vivid rural imagery.
Stanza Two
In summer when I passed the place
I had to stop and lift my face;
A bird with an angelic gift
Was singing in it sweet and swift.
The rhyme scheme and meter continues as it was in the first stanza. The subject matter shifts a bit because the Speaker takes us back into a memory. Though the first stanza is set in the winter, the Speaker now remembers being in his current location, in the summer, and hearing a bird singing.
We can thus infer that the bird he thought he saw in the first stanza is one he is remembers from the summer.
Stanza Three
No bird was singing in it now.
A single leaf was on a bough,
And that was all there was to see
In going twice around the tree.
The poet continues to create a tremendous mental picture. The poet – in search of the bird he thought he saw – has now circles the tree twice but found nothing. We as the Readers can also share in his disappointment. (Is is normal to care so much about birds? Yes.)
In addition to some excellent imagery, Frost also uses my favorite technique word – enjambment – in this stanza. Line 3 flows right into line four with no pause. That reflects his lack of pause in those first two trips around the tree, I’m sure.
Stanzas Four and Five
From my advantage on a hill
I judged that such a crystal chill
Was only adding frost to snow
As gilt to gold that wouldn’t show.A brush had left a crooked stroke
Of what was either cloud or smoke
From north to south across the blue;
A piercing little star was through.
Here we see the poet trying to figure out what it was that he saw, if in fact it wasn’t a bird. He is now standing at a distance, on a hill, guessing. It’s a bit difficult to discern his meaning through his poetic language, but I believe in the fourth stanza he decides that “a crystal chill” (i.e. the wind) blew some snow onto some other snow. He saw the movement, but even the evidence of that movement is gone because everything now matches white on white is as “gilt to gold.”
The sky played into this as well. This is also difficult to discern. He describes what he thinks is either cloud, or smoke, oddly shaped in the sky. The shape of it though was such that it allowed a small star’s light to be visible.
Have you ever thought you saw something, and then you spent way too long to figure out if what you saw was indeed what you saw, but in the end your effort showed you something else that made the effort worth it? I think something like that is happening here. However, as it is Frost, it’s retold in an uncommonly beautiful way.
Now I’m about to provide that for you here. Yes, you endured my review, hoping to get something from it. And though that may not have gone entirely as you wanted, you have now found the link below – which is of Sean Bean reading this very poem. You didn’t know you needed to hear Sean Bean reading poetry, but now that you have, it has changed your life.
