A Critical Analysis of Robert Frost’s Poems Mowing and Fire and Ice

Robert Frost’s Mowing (794) is a modern sonnet which follows an irregular rhyme scheme. Extolled for his realistic depiction of country life, Robert Frost postulates the significance of honest hard work (Meyer, 2003). The poem also desists from attaching sentimental value or wishful thinking to work and sees work as merely the mundane duty to sustain human existence. Having been a farmer, albeit not a very successful one, Robert Frost is opposed to the proposition that fanciful and dreamlike sentiments being attached to simple mundane labor. “What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself:” (line 3, 794).

The poem sets off in a whimsical tone with the poet wondering what it could be that his scythe was whispering back. He abandons this thought before he succumbs to the allure of wishful thinking and imagination. He concedes that the whispering of the scythe might all be in his head. Even if it were whispering, the scythe it would not focus on day-dreaming, imaginations of easy rewards with no labor, or the outcome of the work. The scythe rather derives satisfaction from the work it is doing while contemplating the conditions in the field. The peculiar lack of boisterousness from the perspective of the scythe further emphasizes the point that indeed, all this is in his imagination.

This poem is a sonnet exemplified by its structure, which consists of 14 lines, each having ten syllables written in iambic pentameter. It does, however, conform to the Petrarchan sonnet structure in that its lines can be split into an octave (8 lines) and a sestet (6 lines). In the sestet of this poem, there subsists a volta. This simply means the ideas, thoughts, attitudes, and sentiments of the writer take a completely different turn. It is as if, in the first bit of the poem, the poet poses several questions that are answered in the second half of the poem. This poem combines elements of both Shakespearean and Petrarchan sonnets. The result is an exemplary piece of literature laden with simple metaphorical references.

Before the poem is analyzed further, there is a need to look at the words used and properly to contextualize them. We start with a scythe, which is a farm tool with a long curved blade attached to a long pole with handles. It is used to cut crops in the field, a requiem to the poets farming lifestyle. A swale is a low-lying tract of land, and a fay can be contextualized to mean a fairy, which is a benevolent mythical creature. The word ‘whisper’ is used to refer to the sound that the scythe makes in its motion to cut through vegetation. It personifies the scythe, making it seem like an anthropomorphic companion to the poet in his farming endeavors.

The poet is tempted to see a companion in the scythe, to feel as though he is not alone in work. The poet tries to understand what the scythe is saying, a rather romantic notion. He is snapped back to reality when he concedes that even if the scythe were whispering, it would be going on about labor at hand, the realities of the work in the field. The author construes this as the scythe simply being; doing the work it was purposed to do and fulfilling it. The simple act of the scythe not romanticizing the work also makes him desist from such. He is averse to fantasizing about earning from that which he has not worked for, from the fairies gold instead focusing on the task at hand.

The second poem analyzed in this paper is titled ‘Fire and Ice’ by Robert Frost (799). This short poem explores the themes of the apocalypse, Armageddon, and the destructive fate that awaits the world. The nine lines in this poem are laden with intrigue, irony, dark humor, predictive foresight and question too tough to answer. The poet is more or less asking the reader to choose the lesser of two evils; death by fire or death by ice. The poem’s attitude towards total destruction is cavalier and borderline blasé. He implores the reader to take their pick at their preferred form of destruction as he has already picked his. The mood gets rather somber to the end in that he gives the very possibility of someone perishing twice.

This short-form follows the inverted poetic form with three dominant rhymes established throughout the nine lines of the entire poem. Each line is iambic and consists of either 4 or 8 syllables. The poem takes a simple conversational tone. The wording employed in this poem is direct and simple, which works even better in the last two lines, which serve as the anticlimax and close to the poem. He poses the question between fire and ice, which one is more likely to bring an end to the world. Though the author has a bias to fire as being the agent of a total apocalypse, he is open to the idea of an icy end to the world.

The choice of words might seem simple, but the poet is juxtaposing fire and ice. Fire and ice are used as metaphors for desire and hatred, respectively. The theme of this point is mostly self-destruction of humans occasioned by hatred and desire. It is easy to understand the apocalyptic tone employed in the poem since it was published right on the cusp of the end of World War 1 and the great depression (Litcharts, 2019). The poet recognizes the capacity of hatred and desire to bring an end to the world if unchecked. By desire, the author means hatred, anger, pure bloodlust, and antagonistic violence. This is why the poet thinks the world is more likely to end in a fire since this exemplifies the direct conflict.

The destruction of humanity is not only reserved for direct conflict as there are more subtle ways hence the ice. Ice exemplifies hatred, coldness, and indifference. These are all indirect actions or inaction. This includes leaving vices unchecked or not heading clear warnings. In the contemporary view, this can be construed as the inaction we take towards climate change. We feel indifferent, like its someone else's problem. The poet makes it clear if one will not end us, then the other surely will.