Birches Case
Essay by elizabeth83 • May 9, 2013 • Essay • 322 Words (2 Pages) • 1,213 Views
In Robert Frost's "Birches" he inadvertently expresses the values of a simplistic lifestyle. By doing this it emphasizes the point that being a Caucasian male he has had less struggles. Frost's poem reiterates how his childhood was not faced with racial struggles. Instead he talks about young boys spending their days swinging on trees, "riding them down over and over again until they took the stiffness out of them..."(Line 29, Frost). While the other poems show people having to eat in another room when company comes or not being able to speak up when something is wrongly stated about their culture. Robert's poem depicts a young boy swinging on trees as an escape from his "hard life." He depicts a young American boy in a simplistic midwestern setting going to "fetch the cows" and hoping to "learn baseball" (Line 26, Frost). Robert's poem shows a typical white American boy, not faced with internal struggles do to his religion or race. The young boy is carefree not having to be weighed down by hardships that face many other people simply because they are not the same religion or race as the majority. The poem also shows the differences of a typical American boy and man. The boy see's swinging on tress as a playful and fun. He has no responsibilities weighing him down. However, the man realizes he is too old to be swinging on trees and is in desperate search to find an escape by other means. The typical American man no matter what race has struggles pulling him down that wont let him swing on the trees, the man knows that if he tries it would just, "dip (him) down again" (Line 54, Frost).
This was very hard for me because I still don't fully understand my poem.
I would like you to mostly focus your feedback on my main points because that is what I got out of the poem.
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