FREE ESSAY ON TO EARTHWARD BY ROBERT FROST

TO EARTHWARD BY ROBERT FROST

English IV AP 
February 2000
To Earthward
Robert Frost's To Earthward is an intimate lyric in which an old man reflects upon his
passionate experiences with love as a youth and the lack of such experiences in his old
age. Through diction, imagery and structure, the tone of the speaker changes from one of
gentle nostalgia to resentment toward the ephemeral nature of love. 
The entire poem, which consists of eight quatrains, adheres to a structure of six
syllables in the first three lines of a quatrain and four syllables in the last line.
Also throughout the colloquial piece are external rhymes, which are sometimes imperfect,
but are used to keep the steady rhythm. This use of diction and structure makes the poem
seem more universal. The speaker's situation is one that we all will experience someday.
Alliteration is for emphasize in bitter bark/ And burning clove (23-24) and stiff and
sore and scarred (25). The alliteration of harsh B and blunt S sounds accentuate the
speaker's discontent with the dispassionate state of his current way of life. 
In the first four quatrains the speaker is reminiscing about his experiences with love in
his youth. He recalls how little it took to enchant him and that love at the lips was
touch/ as sweet as I could bear (1-2) for in his youth love had seemed extremely intense.
Vivid descriptions create a vibrant and fragrant image of his early love as a musk/ From
hidden grapevine springs/ Downhill at dusk (6-8) that made him feel as though he would
swirl and ache/ From sprays of honeysuckle/ That when they're gathered shake/ Dew on the
knuckle (9-12). But the image of a rose petal that stings in lines 15-16 begins the
speaker's diversion toward resentment. He implies that the joyful aspects of love are so
intense because of the pain and tension that accompany love. Now that he is old, the
speaker feels the need to live passionately before he dies. He no longer 
fears the pain that accompanies love because he desperately longs for the intense love he
experienced as a youth. He crave(s) the stain/ Of tears, the aftermark/ Of almost too
much love (21-22) because he did not appreciate the transient nature of love until too
late in his life. He is left to pound on the ground (his future resting-place), resentful
that his longing for love will never be as intense as the experience of love itself.