I wrote the following short piece for Fresh Ink, my writers club journal, but I decided to share it here because... it's the Solstice. And why not?
In “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” Robert
Frost describes a reverie he’s had on the night of the December solstice as he
stops to watch the snow fall on a neighbor’s woods. It’s a lovely image—the white
flakes falling, dusting the trees with winter icing. As his “little horse,” impatient
to move on, shakes himself, his harness bells—sleigh bells—jingle. Apart from
that, they are in a place so isolated, it’s quiet enough to hear the snow
falling. (“The only other sound’s the sweep/of easy wind and downy flake.”)
We love this poem because,
the Christmas season being what it is, with its frenetic activity of shopping,
wrapping, preparing, cooking, and so forth, we relate to the final lines of the
poem: “But I have promises to keep/And miles to go before I sleep/And miles to
go before I sleep.”
Until I memorized this poem long
ago (along with a freshman English class I was teaching), I didn’t fully
appreciate the line that comes before those final lines: “The woods are lovely,
dark and deep.” It seems there is a certain reluctance here to push on, get
those chores done, those promises kept, get out of the cold and into a warm
bed. Why? What drives a man to sit in a sleigh and stare, when he has so much
at home compelling him to get moving?
This is what I relate to,
the dragging of his feet, the lure of the woods. As much as we would love to
remember Frost as the kind, grandfatherly man who wrote of nature and farming,
he was a profoundly troubled individual who possessed the requisite tortured
soul of many poets. Consider this: His sister spent her last years in a mental
institution, as did one of Frost’s daughters. One son died of cholera at the
age of four; the other committed suicide when he was thirty-eight. Frost would
outlive this son by twenty-three years, which is a long, long time to carry
such grief.
Suffice it to say, the poet
experienced his share of sadness and depression. What comforted him, we assume
from his work, was the beauty and resiliency he observed in nature, the
constancy and routine of the seasons’ change.
Many decades ago, when I had
recently emerged, battle weary and deeply depressed, from the worst year of my
life, two friends stopped by my house and nearly dragged me out to hike with
them. I had no hiking boots, only sneakers. It was January, and while the
golden California sun was shining, it had snowed in the mountains the night
before—which is where they insisted on taking me, up to the nearest mountain,
Mt. Baldy, for a long walk up a winding fire road that eventually led to a
crystal-clear view of the valley below.
The snow was the brightest
white I had ever seen. The trees, warmed by the sun, gave off an aromatic scent
of pine you will never find in a cleaning product or deodorizer. And after
miles of hiking, endorphins flooding my brain, I was hooked. Here was solace.
Here was comfort. The sights, the smells, these two goofball friends who told
stories and laughed and kept me moving until I was (finally!) warm, gave me the
gift of hiking to achieve balance and perspective, to be reminded that, as
nature endures, so will I. The hours we spent were more memorable than I can
describe, and I will be grateful for it through the rest of my days.
“The woods are lovely, dark
and deep.” During the holiday season, this line will come to me at the oddest
times—standing in line at Target, sitting on the floor wrapping gifts, breathing
deeply in heavy traffic as I try to remain calm and get to my destination
alive. They will draw me out, those woods, and offer me quiet moments of
solitary, serene walking in between the frenzied times. And I will remember
Frost and his work with much gratitude.
