Poetic Elements in “After Apple Picking”
Poetry is a type of writing that challenges one’s ability to interpret the meaning of certain literary works. Poems can be deciphered by analyzing the poetic elements that the author uses in his / her writing. The style of language can change how the poem is read through the use of simple words, metaphors, and allusions. The imagery in poetic writing allows for poetry to appeal to one’s senses. Also, the symbolism in a poem allows for characters and objects within the play to be representative of something else that has meaning. Robert Frost is perhaps the most successful American poet of his time. He endured popular and critical acclaim throughout his entire career, which spanned fifty years and ended with his death in 1963. Frost’s popularity came from his ability to keep in touch with American persistence, folk humor, plain speech, and attachment to the land. His most distinctive characteristic in his writing was his elusiveness. This quality allowed for his poems to operate on many levels, allowing one to see his / her beliefs in his writing. In the literary work “After Apple Picking,” by Robert Frost, the author creates a poem consisting of theme, imagery, and symbolism.
The theme in the poem allows for the style of the writer to be clearly expressed. In “After Apple Picking,” Frost allows for the development of the theme through the use of dramatic situation, dramatic moment, and narrative persona (Beacham, Notable Poets 368). In the poem, the speaker becomes tired after a long day of apple picking. The speaker has been in a tired state since waking that morning. When the day is over, he is tired, but wonders if this sleep will be just that or something deeper. Frost uses the first six lines to introduce facts within the dramatic situation which seem extraneous to the poem’s development (Beacham, Notable Poets 368). Frost writes, “My long two-pointed ladder’s sticking through a tree / Toward heaven still / And...