“leave me alone in the dark / i am shedding my skin / i need to harden my heart”

[larryhammer]

For Poetry Monday, back again to Frost:

Desert Places, Robert Frost

Snow falling and night falling fast, oh, fast
In a field I looked into going past,
And the ground almost covered smooth in snow,
But a few weeds and stubble showing last.

The woods around it have it—it is theirs.
All animals are smothered in their lairs.
I am too absent-spirited to count;
The loneliness includes me unawares.

And lonely as it is, that loneliness
Will be more lonely ere it will be less—
A blanker whiteness of benighted snow
With no expression, nothing to express.

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces
Between stars—on stars where no human race is.
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places.


Written in 1933 and collected in A Further Range. I want to sit this one down on a porch next to “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” (1922) and listen to their conversation.

---L.

Subject quote from Cobra (Rock Remix), Megan Thee Stallion feat. Spiritbox.

Comments

[conuly]

I'm not familiar with this Frost poem. Thanks!

[larryhammer]

It's not an anthology staple, though it should be. It does get a lot of critical commentary.

[de_eekhoorn]

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces
Between stars—on stars where no human race is.
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places.

This reminds me of William Empson's Letter I:

You were amused to find you too could fear
'The eternal silence of the infinite spaces'
(...)
I approve, myself, dark spaces between stars...

[larryhammer]

I see why!

[cmcmck]

I've just posted an R S Thomas poem- I sometimes wonder if he knew Frost's work.

[larryhammer]

I've always assumed so, but I've no definite confirmation of it.

[sunlit_stone]

Oh man, this is a really good one. Trying to list parts I love especially but I keep listing the whole damn poem. But "The loneliness includes me unawares" is really great--and I love "With no expression, nothing to express"--and of course the whole last stanza is fantastic. Thank you for sharing!

[larryhammer]

It was apparently one of those gift works -- Frost claimed to have written it "without fumbling a sentence." I think it shows.