Robert Frost 部分诗选及简介
Robert Frost(罗伯特·弗罗斯特 1874～1963)
Robert Frost, Poet
◇Born: 26 March 1874
◆Birthplace: San Francisco, California
◇Died: 29 January 1963
◆Best Known As: American poet who wrote "The Road Not Taken"
The poetry of Robert Frost combined pastoral imagery with solitary philosophical themes and was often associated with rural New England. Frost was one of the most popular poets in America during his lifetime and was frequently called the country's unofficial poet laureate. He was farming in Derry, New Hampshire when, at the age of 38, he sold the farm, uprooted his family and moved to England, where he devoted himself to his poetry. His first two books of verse, A Boy's Will (1913) and North of Boston (1914), were immediate successes. In 1915 he returned to the United States and continued to publish poems that were both popular and critical successes. His poems include "Mending Wall" ("good fences make good neighbors"), "Birches," "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" ("Whose woods these are I think I know"), and "The Road Not Taken." Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize four times: in 1924, 1931, 1937 and 1943. He also served as "Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress" from 1958-59; that position was renamed as "Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry" in 1986.
Frost read his poem "The Gift Outright" at the 1961 inauguration of John F. Kennedy... Frost preferred traditional rhyme and meter in poetry; his famous dismissal of free verse was, "I'd just as soon play tennis with the net down."
【FOUR GOOD LINKS】
☆The Robert Frost Web Page
http://www.robertfrost.org/indexgood.html
Biography, interviews and select poems
★Robert Frost: America's Poet
http://www.ketzle.com/frost/
Timeline biography and several of his poems
☆A Frost Bouquet
http://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/frost/home.html
Terrific exhibit from the University of Virginia
★Frost in The Atlantic Monthly
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/199604u/frost-intro
1996 profile that includes poems and readings
弗罗斯特(Robert Frost)(1874～1963)美国诗人。1874年3月26日生于美国西部的旧金山。他11岁丧父，后随母亲迁居东北部的新英格兰。此后，他就与那块土地结下了不解之缘。弗罗斯特16岁开始写诗，20岁时正式发表第一首诗歌。他勤奋笔耕，一生中共出了10多本诗集，其中主要的有《波士顿以北》(1914)，《山间》(1916)，《新罕布什尔》(1923)，《西流的小溪》(1928)，《见证树》(1942)以及《林间空地》(1962)等。弗罗斯特的诗可分为两大类：抒情短诗和戏剧性较强的叙事诗，两者都脍炙人口。弗罗斯特的抒情诗主要描写了大自然和农民，尤其是新英格兰的景色和北方的农民。这些诗形象而生动，具有很强的感染力，深受各层次读者的欢迎。他的叙事诗一般都格调低沉，体现了诗人思想和性格中阴郁的一面。弗罗斯特的世界观是比较复杂的，他把世界看成是一个善与恶的混合体。因此，他的诗一方面描写了大自然的美和自然对人类的恩惠，另一方面也写了其破坏力以及给人类带来的不幸和灾难。弗罗斯特诗歌风格上的一个最大特点是朴素无华，含义隽永，寓深刻的思考和哲理于平淡无奇的内容和简洁朴实的诗句之中。这既是弗罗斯特的艺术追求，也是他事业成功的秘密所在。
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening (1923)
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
=====================================================
译文1：雪夜林前小驻
谁之丛林我已知晓
村中他家难以寻找
他难见我在此滞留
观望林莽银装素袍
我的爱马想必惊讶
为何呆在荒林野郊
左有冰湖右有密林
更在如此漆黑之宵
轻轻振响颈上铜铃
询问是否其中有错
雪夜荒原万籁俱静
惟有寒风伴着落雪
丛林迷人幽暗深远
可我早已许下诺言
路迢途远岂敢酣眠
路迢途远岂敢酣眠
这首《雪夜林前小驻》所描写的情景不用解释，但它后面的情趣、哲理、魅力，需要细细品位。我独自站在树林边沿，里面有一种东西在吸引我，但不能光听内心世界的召唤，我还要许多世间的约会、责任，“路迢途远岂敢酣眠”，这里的“眠”既是陶醉，又是安静，或是心灵的平静。一个情景，引起人无限遐想，每个人会根据自己的经历体会无数个生活背后的韵味。
=====================================================
译文2：雪夜林畔小驻
(译)余光中
想来我认识这座森林，
林主的庄宅就在邻村,
却不会见我在此驻马，
看他林中积雪的美景。
我的小马一定颇惊讶：
四望不见有什么农家，
偏是一年最暗的黄昏，
寒林和冰湖之间停下。
它摇一摇身上的串铃，
问我这地方该不该停。
此外只有轻风拂雪片，
再也听不见其他声音。
森林又暗又深真可羡，
但我还要守一些诺言，
还要赶多少路才安眠，
还要赶多少路才安眠。
=====================================================
（四十才出名的）弗洛斯特对自己的要求是清醒与独立。对他而言，诗是“刹那之间的免于混乱”。当众流东趋而入海，他宁可做西行的溪水，保持自我。弗洛斯特的人生态度，是古典主义的兼容并包，行乎中庸之道，对生命的矛盾淡然受之，而且加以调和。他对人间也有种种不满，但他认为人间仍是最好的去处；他说他和世界的争执不过是“情人的吵架”。弗洛斯特真是一位人世间的诗人，嘴里埋怨着，心里却热爱着。在名诗《赤杨树》结尾时，他说：
我真想离开世界一阵子，
然后再回来，从头开始。
但愿命运莫故意会错意，
只偿我半个愿望，把我抓走，
一去不回头。用情该用在人间：
想不出有哪里日子更好过。
要我过我情愿爬赤杨树，
攀黑枝顺着雪白的树干，
向天国，直到树身盛不住，
只好垂下梢顶放我下地来。
弗在诗中暗示，少年应有理想，但理想只是现实的延伸，有其极限。到了极限，自然要重回现实来，再认人生。（余光中）
诗要“兴于喜悦，而终于彻悟”——弗洛斯特
Nothing Gold Can Stay
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
1. Nature's first green is gold,
2. Her hardest hue to hold.
3. Her early leaf's a flower;
4. But only so an hour.
5. Then leaf subsides to leaf.
6. So Eden sank to grief,
7. So dawn goes down to day.
8. Nothing gold can stay.
没有最美好的东西长久不变
——美国诗人罗伯特.弗罗斯特
自然界的第一件东西宝贵如金子一般，
但是极难永远保持不变。
她的第一片叶如同花儿，
但只会停留瞬间。
叶落叶生最常见。
难怪乐极生悲，
黎明发展下去是白天。
没有最美好的东西长久不变
岁月流金
宜人香色最难存。
丝丝细叶美如葩，
少倾迷失其芳华。
绿叶消溶于流光，
乐园沉沦多感伤。
黎明没入平凡日，
美景终会随风逝。
--罗伯特 .弗洛斯特
黄金之物不久全 Nothing Gold Can Stay
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
作者：宋颖豪
自然的新绿是金， Nature's first green is gold，
鲜美色彩难保存。 Her hardest hue to hold.
初发叶芽即是花； Her early leaf's a flower；
仅能持续一刹那。 But only an hour.
遂而新芽长成叶。 Then leaf subsides to leaf.
伊甸顿然陷悲切， So Eden sank to grief，
曙晓瞬已大白天。 So dawn goes down to day.
黄金之物不久全。 Nothing gold can stay.
黃金事物難久留
1. 自然的初綠是為金,
2. 她這種色彩最難存.
3. 她的新葉像朵花;
4. 但也只能保剎那.
5. 之後葉復褪為葉.
6. 同理伊甸淪悲切,
7. 同理清晨沉為晝.
8. 黃金事物難久留.
(彭鏡禧 夏燕生 譯)
黄金时代倍难留
大自然的新绿是黄金，
可叹难持久！
大自然的初叶是鲜花，
可叹一时休。
终于落木萧萧下，
伊甸满园愁，
朝晖化白昼，
黄金时代倍难留。
The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
The Road Not Taken 沒走的路
1. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
2. And sorry I could not travel both
3. And be one traveler, long I stood
4. And looked down one as far as I could
5. To where it bent in the undergrowth;
6. Then took the other, as just as fair,
7. And having perhaps the better claim,
8. Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
9. Though as for that the passing there
10. Had worn them really about the same,
11. And both that morning equally lay
12. In leaves no step had trodden black.
13. Oh, I kept the first for another day!
14. Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
15. I doubted if I should ever come back.
16. I shall be telling this with a sigh
17. Somewhere ages and ages hence:
18. Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
19. I took the one less traveled by,
20. And that has made all the difference.
1. 兩條路在黃樹林裡分叉,
2. 但可惜我不能兩條都走
3. 身為旅者,我佇立良久
4. 我看一條路盡可能看得遠
5. 直到它轉進樹叢內;
6. 然後再看另一條,幾乎一樣,
7. 但說不定更好,
8. 因綠草如茵邀人踩;
9. 雖然在那路口
10. 踩過的痕跡幾乎一樣,
11. 在那早晨同樣並列在
12. 未被踩過的葉子下.
13. 喔,我保留第一條給改天走!
14. 雖知道一路走下去又接著路,
15. 我懷疑我是否該回頭.
16. 我將歎息著述說這事
17. 在此很久很久後某時:
18. 兩條路在樹林內分叉,而我--
19. 我選擇了較少人走的,
20. 而這造成了所有的差別.
Neuro 黃學仁 譯;
1. 在黃樹林裡有兩條岔路
2. 遺憾的是我無法兩條都走
3. 身為一個路人,我佇立良久
4. 我使勁地眺望其一
5. 它蜿蜒的沒入草叢裡
6. 爾後,我也同樣努力的眺望了另一條路
7. 也許我獲得比較強力的支撐點
8. 因為那條路花草濃密，了無人跡;
9. 兩路末端相通，
10. 那麼結局便無差別。
11. 那天早上兩條路同樣的橫在眼前
12. 落葉飄飛,林間乏人可問
13. 哦,我把第一條路保留著,改天再走吧!
14. 縱然知道如何再回到這條路上來,
15. 我不敢說我會再回來
16. 多少年後，我將喟然興嘆，
17. 從前從前在某處:
18. 樹林裡有兩條岔路,而我--
19. 我選擇了一條比較少人走的
20. 造成完全不同的結果.
(huanyin 譯; 2005-03-12)
1. 兩條路在黃色的樹林間叉開，
2. 可惜我不能走兩條路。
3. 我這個過客久久徘徊，
4. 極目望去，一條路在遠處，
5. 蜿蜒地進入樹林荒蕪；
6. 我向另一條路望去，同樣平坦，
7. 也許它更值得行走，
8. 因為它長滿茸茸綠草，等待人們的踐踏；
9. 雖然它也已紛亂，
10. 行人在這裡過往奔沓。
11. 那天清晨，兩條路上覆滿樹葉，
12. 沒有腳步把它們踏碎。
13. 啊，哪一天我將走第一條路！
14. 雖然我知道條條路相接，
15. 我仍懷疑是否仍能走回原路。
16. 我將把這事告訴別人，
17. 一面深深嘆息。
18. 樹林中有兩股岔道，
19. 而我走的那條路行人稀少，
20. 這就造成了一切的差異。
1. 黃樹林裡分叉兩條路，
2. 只可惜我不能都踏行。
3. 我，單獨的旅人，佇立良久，
4. 極目眺望一條路的盡頭，
5. 看它隱沒在叢林深處。
6. 於是我選擇了另一條路，
7. 一樣平直，也許更值得，
8. 因為青草茵茵，還未被踏過，
9. 若有過往人蹤，
10. 路的狀況會相差無幾。
11. 那天早晨，兩條路都覆蓋在枯葉下，
12. 沒有踐踏的污痕：
13. 啊，原先那條路留給另一天吧！
14. 明知一條路會引出另一條路，
15. 我懷疑我是否會回到原處。
16. 在許多許多年以後，在某處，
17. 我會輕輕歎息說：
18. 黃樹林裡分叉兩條路，而我，
19. 我選擇了較少人跡的一條，
20. 使得一切多麼地不同。
未選擇的路
1. 黃葉林中出條岔路，
2. 無奈一人難於兼顧，
3. 順著一條婉蜒小路，
4. 久久佇立極目遠眺，
5. 只見小徑拐進灌木。
6. 接著選擇了另一條，
7. 同樣清楚似乎更好，
8. 引人踩踏鋪滿茂草，
9. 踏在其間難分彼此，
10. 儘管真有兩條道。
11. 清晨裏躺著兩條路，
12. 一樣葉被無人踏髒，
13. 願將第一條來日補，
14. 但知條條相連遠途，
15. 懷疑日後怎能回返。
16. 在很久以後某一地，
17. 我將歎息訴說於人，
18. 兩路岔開在樹林裏，
19. 我選的那條足跡稀，
20. 而一切差別由此起。
1. 金色樹林分兩條岔路
2. 遺憾未能兩者都試
3. 身為旅者，我駐足良久
4. 遠眺其中一條
5. 直到山路消失灌木叢中
6. 然後，踏上另外一條，似乎差不多
7. 或許更佳美之徑
8. 因綠草如蔭引人上路
9. 然而若有過往人蹤
10. 兩條路況恐怕相差無幾
11. 當日清晨，兩條道路皆是
12. 滿佈落葉無人踐踏
13. 唉，留著第一條改天再走吧！
14. 其實我何等明白：一路通往一路
15. 豈容有回頭機會
16. 多年之後某個時候
17. 帶著一聲歎息，我要告訴你：
18. 樹林裡分兩條岔路，而我——
19. 選擇了人煙較少的那條
20. 結果是如此不同
沒有選中的路
1. 黃色的樹林中分出兩條道，
2. 可惜我不能兩條都選。
3. 一人豈能同行兩條道，
4. 我久立而難前。
5. 放眼朝一條道望去，
6. 直到轉角擋住了視野。
7. 再看第二條路，同樣佳美，
8. 也許還有更好的得著，
9. 因它草綠待踏。
10. 儘管那另一條道，
11. 差不多同樣候人踏上。
12. 那日清晨兩條路同在眼前
13. 都是落葉未經腳步踏
14. 哦，下一次再試那第一條吧！
15. 但心裡深知一路通一路，越踏越深，
16. 我疑惑應否回返原地。
17. 我會以嘆息傳告此舉
18. 在許久、許久的未來：
19. 兩條道在樹林中分叉而出，我－－
20. 我選中了那條少人行走的路，
21. 它因此帶來了全然不同的結局。
(林潔 譯)
沒有走的路
1. 黃樹林裡岔開兩條路
2. 很遺憾我不能都涉足
3. 我孤單地站立良久
4. 向其中一條極目望去
5. 看它彎沒在林蔭的深處
6. 然後走另一條 同樣清幽
7. 也許還多些魅力：
8. 那綠草茵茵似乎更盼望人跡
9. 但其實這兩條路的過況
10. 也沒有那麼大的差異
11. 那個早晨兩條路躺在前面
12. 落葉都還沒有遭污跡踏踐
13. 啊！第一條改天再走吧！
14. 只是來路遙遙地相接
15. 我恐怕無法再回到原點
16. 多年後的某時某地
17. 我回憶此刻將輕聲嘆息：
18. 樹林裏岔開兩條路 而我－
19. 我走了人跡較少的那一條
20. 因此有了完全不同的人生
(尤克強譯)
Robert Frost作詩的一個特點便是善於運用眼前看似平淡無奇的瑣事，來表達一個深刻的思想或哲理。換言之，他長於運用具體的事物以說明抽象的概念，使讀者易於接受和瞭解。本詩便是一個最好的例子。
在本詩裡，詩人回顧往日，在他人生的旅途中曾遭遇岔道的困擾，兩條叉路擺在眼前，任擇其一，魚與熊掌勢難得兼。他跓立路口，沉思良久，放眼望去，只是其中 一條的盡頭淹沒在叢林裡，又見另一條綠草如茵，杳無人跡，於是走上了這條自認少人行走的路。但經他一走，也免難足跡斑斑了。既走上了這條路，還冀望來日再 走那條，但又自知人生旅途如大江東去，勢難折回。在此，詩人表現了一絲淡淡的懊悔，對這種人力不可挽回的事，也沒奈之何。
再遙想未來，自己將嘆一口氣，把這故事重提，當時選擇了這條人跡鮮稀之途，才有今日的種種。
本詩是以某樹林為背景，但卻可轉用到任何地點和任何時間上去。
詩人在追憶昔日可能發生而未發生的事，當時的一個決定便影響後來的一切。
這是人人在日常生活 中都會遭遇的難題，作者以簡明的筆調，生動的畫面說明了這個事實。
用字平實，共分為四節，每節押韻很工整，都依×○××○這樣的韻型寫成。
註:
19 行為何說 took the one "less" traveled by ?
之前明明是說:
And looked down one as far as I could (他可是有先盤算一下的)
To where it bent in the undergrowth; (先觀察了第一條路直看到路的盡頭)
Then took the other, as just as fair, 第二條路也幾乎一樣
And having perhaps the better claim, 但甚至他還選了比較有利的(第二條路)
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same 不過其實差不多
And both that morning equally lay 兩邊一樣
所以, 當他說
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence: 多年以後,我將會這麼說:
...
I took the one less traveled by, (我選擇了少人走的)
所以表示,他準備到時要 吹牛
(騙那些後生小子 - 就是讀他的詩的人啦-不要笑,就是你 :)
老傢伙在講故事給那些後生小伙子,騙得他們一愣一愣的,
大家還都信以為真 - 到處引用
"小子們~, 你們看,我當初就是故意選那個冷門的,特立的,困難的,沒人要去的,...,才有今日"
- 他哪有~...
"And having perhaps the better claim," 他實際是選了比較有利的(第二條路)
這(本)是作者幽默處 :)
讀者不可不查 :)
(但,竊以為,大家都被他這將來準備老來膨風話給騙了:)
(啊~ 舉世滔滔 獨我看破這(未來的老)詩人愛說笑 :)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening 雪夜駐馬林畔
1. Whose woods these are I think I know.
2. His house is in the village, though;
3. He will not see me stopping here
4. To watch his woods fill up with snow.
5. My little horse must think it queer
6. To stop without a farmhouse near
7. Between the woods and frozen lake
8. The darkest evening of the year.
9. He gives his harness bells a shake
10. To ask if there is some mistake.
11. The only other sound's the sweep
12. Of easy wind and downy flake.
13. The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
14. But I have promises to keep,
15. And miles to go before I sleep,
16. And miles to go before I sleep.
1. 這是誰家森林,我想我懂.
2. 雖然他的房子是在村中;
3. 他不會看見我駐馬於此
4. 觀望他的森林積雪重重.
5. 我的馬兒一定認為奇異
6. 駐步於此近無農舍之地
7. 在這森林與那冰湖中間
8. 一年之中最黑暗的夜裡.
9. 牠把韁轡上配鈴撳一撳
10. 探問會不會有什麼錯亂.
11. 此外悄然更無其他聲息
12. 除了微風與柔雪的拂拌.
13. 森林誠然可愛,幽暗深邃.
14. 但我還要謹守一些約誓,
15. 還要走好幾里路才入睡,
16. 還要走好幾里路才入睡.
(施潁洲 譯)
一、 類型(Genre)
這首詩的背景有原野、森林、湖泊、村莊，與農舍。此外還有雪片紛飛著的雪景。主述人乘著小馬車，路過這樣一個引人入勝的地方，情不自禁的停下來，欣賞黃昏時刻大自然的美景。陶醉在這樣的美景之中，雖然依依不捨，但卻又不得不離開，繼續他的行程。
這首詩的背景充滿田園詩(pastoral poetry)的風格，內容在發抒主述人心中矛盾的情緒，因此這首詩又可以說是一首田園式的抒情詩(pastoral lyric poem)。從這首詩中象徵的意義上看來，這是一首有思想的詩(a poem of idea)，表現出主述人對自然與人生的看法，其間隱約還帶有說教(didactic)的意味。
二、 主題(Theme)
表面上，我們覺得主述人只是在描寫森林中美麗的雪景，發抒個人心中矛盾情緒。通常我們認為在兩種不同的欲望同時發生時，便會產生矛盾的情緒。主述人來到森 林處，一方面被美景所吸引，想要探究自然的神秘；一方面他還有不得不做的事情。詩中主述人說得很清楚，停下馬來是因為"To watch the woods fill up with snow"。主述人心中為何會有矛盾的情緒呢！他說："But I have promises to keep"。簡言之，主述人想要表達的就是「矛盾情緒」的概念。從象徵的觀點上來看這首詩的意義便更深長了，因為主述人心中的小衝突(small conflict)象徵著人生際遇中許多的大衝突(large conflict)。主述人好像在暗示"promises"很重要，我們無法永遠沉醉在美的懷抱之中，所以說這首詩內容上有點說教意味，但並未被清楚的表 達出來。
三、象徵與對比(Symbols and Contrast)
詩中最明顯的象徵與對比便是"woods"和"snow"。森林可能象徵自然的神秘；雪可能象徵純潔，崇高等等。兩者之間正好構成強烈的對比。第一節中， 主述人說他停下馬來是"To watch the woods fill up with snow."，這句話彷彿是在告訴我們神秘的自然表面時常蓋著一層看似單純的東西；表面上看起來是"lovely"，事實上卻是"dark and deep"（第十三行）。"lovely"和"dark and deep"便是象徵「善」與惡或「單純」與「複雜」式的對比。最後主述人像是在感嘆著想要去探究那"dark and deep"中的神秘是不大可能，因為人生中要做的事情著實太多了。
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
最後一行的"sleep"可能象徵著「死亡」。這便是這首詩更深一層的意義。同時說明了作者對自然的態度。
四、聲響與意義(Sound and Sense)
一首好詩的聲韻效果必與意義有下可分的關係。這首詩的韻律就是這個樣子，非常有規律。全詩共分四節(stanzas)，每節各四行(lines)，每一行 都是很規律的抑揚四步格 (iambic tretrameter)。押韻(rhyme)除最後一節外也都是很有規律的，即 /aaba/bbcb/ccdc/dddd/節奏的單調規律情形正可用來表達日常生活的缺乏變化。作者似乎故意在最後的一節破壞 /aaba/bbcb/ccdc/dded/的循環韻律，來表現主述人被森林美景所吸引，因而主述人規律的生活引起了變化，並使主述人平靜的內心產生矛盾 的情緒。這首詩被認為是一首好詩，這或許是其中的原因之一。
Mending Wall
by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
1. Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
2. That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
3. And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
4. And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
5. The work of hunters is another thing:
6. I have come after them and made repair
7. Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
8. But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
9. To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
10. No one has seen them made or heard them made,
11. But at spring mending-time we find them there.
12. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
13. And on a day we meet to walk the line
14. And set the wall between us once again.
15. We keep the wall between us as we go.
16. To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
17. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
18. We have to use a spell to make them balance:
19. 'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'
20. We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
21. Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
22. One on a side. It comes to little more:
23. There where it is we do not need the wall:
24. He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
25. My apple trees will never get across
26. And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
27. He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors'.
28. Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
29. If I could put a notion in his head:
30. 'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
31. Where there are cows?
32. But here there are no cows.
33. Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
34. What I was walling in or walling out,
35. And to whom I was like to give offence.
36. Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
37. That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him,
38. But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
39. He said it for himself. I see him there
40. Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
41. In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
42. He moves in darkness as it seems to me~
43. Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
44. He will not go behind his father's saying,
45. And he likes having thought of it so well
46. He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."
补墙
1. 有一點什麼，它大概是不喜歡牆，
2. 它使得牆腳下的凍地漲得隆起，
3. 大白天的把牆頭石塊弄得紛紛落：
4. 使得牆裂了縫，二人並肩都走得過。
5. 士紳們行獵時又是另一番糟蹋：
6. 他們要掀開每塊石頭上的石頭，
7. 我總是跟在他們後面去修補，
8. 但是他們要把兔子從隱處趕出來，
9. 討好那群汪汪叫的狗。我說的牆縫
10. 是怎麼生的，誰也沒看見，誰也沒聽見
11. 但是到了春季補牆時，就看見在那裏。
12. 我通知了住在山那邊的鄰居；
13. 有一天我們約會好，巡視地界一番，
14. 在我們兩家之間再把牆重新砌起。
15. 我們走的時候，中間隔著一垛牆。
16. 我們走的時候，中間隔著一垛培。
17. 落在各邊的石頭，由各自去料理。
18. 有些是長塊的，有些幾乎圓得像球．
19. 需要一點魔術才能把它們放穩當：
20. “老實呆在那裏，等我們轉過身再落下！”
21. 我們搬弄石頭．把手指都磨粗了。
22. 啊！這不過又是一種戶外遊戲，
23. 一個人站在一邊。此外沒有多少用處：
24. 在牆那地方，我們根本不需要牆：
25. 他那邊全是松樹，我這邊是蘋果園。
26. 我的蘋果樹永遠也不會踱過去
27. 吃掉他松樹下的松球，我對他說。
28. 他只是說：“好籬笆造出好鄰家。”
29. 春天在我心裏作祟，我在懸想
30. 能不能把一個念頭注入他的腦裏：
31. “為什麼好籬笆造出好鄰家？是否指著
32. 有牛的人家？可是我們此地又沒有牛。
33. 我在造牆之前．先要弄個清楚，
34. 圈進來的是什麼，圈出去的是什麼，
35. 並且我可能開罪的是些什麼人家，
36. 有一點什麼，它不喜歡牆，
37. 它要推倒它。”我可以對他說這是“鬼”。
38. 但嚴格說也不是鬼．我想這事還是
39. 由他自己決定吧。我看見他在那裏
40. 搬一塊石頭，兩手緊抓著石頭的上端，
41. 像一個舊石器時代的武裝的野蠻人。
42. 我覺得他是在黑暗中摸索，
43. 這黑暗不僅是來自深林與樹蔭。
44. 他不肯探究他父親傳給他的格言
45. 他想到這句格言，便如此的喜歡，
46. 於是再說一遍，“好籬笆造出好鄰家”。
(梁實秋 譯)
本詩以簡明的語言敘述對於牆的兩種不同的態度。詩中的Speaker直接或間接說出他不願有牆的見解。而主張樹牆的對方的愚昧則以輕鬆的揶揄 (II.17-77) 或正面的批評(11.30-36, 38-42)揭露之。
不喜歡牆的"Something" (II.1, 35)及"it" (I.38)多半指一種代表自然的力量(II.2-3, 9-11)，而有反對牆的"notion" (I.29)的"T"於充滿希望的春天來補牆，實出於鄰人的固埶而無奈為之。詩中irony可由兩個鄰居會同建立使兩人分離的牆處看出。
全詩45行，無韻詩體(blank verse)。約可分為四段：
(1)第1-11行敘述石牆損壞的事實及原因。
(2)第12-20行描寫補牆的經過。
(3)第22-27行，Speaker 認為牆沒有用，他的鄰居卻主張「好籬笆造出好鄰家。」
(4)第28-45行說明Speaker試圖說明對方未果，並批評對方的愚昧。
「好籬笆造出好鄰居」這一句話並非全無道理。在某些情況下，我們甚至可以認為這是一句金玉良言。有些讀者或許會認為Frost讓Speaker的鄰居在詩 的中央(I.27)及最後(I.45)重覆這句話，便是意味著Frost贊成鄰居對牆的態度。但這是誤解 Speaker的真正的觀點。我們應該特別注意Speaker並非絕對的反對牆，而只是反對無用的，不必要的牆。
第30-34行意味著 Speaker也承 認當有牲畜擾害鄰居等情事時，牆仍可能是構成鄰居和睦相處的條件。這種開明的態度使Speaker有資格批評泥古不化的鄰居的頑迷。第41-42行中的 "darkness"實指未經啟蒙的野人的黑暗；是精神的黑暗，而不只是樹林的黑暗。
本詩的措辭極為平易，意象語亦多採自然的景物，兩者與詩的題材和人物的配合都非常穩當。在"T"與"my neighbor"的意見的對峙中，詩人使"hunters," "dogs," "rabbits,"及"Sun"等配合"Something"（意指自然，已見前述），而以"an old-stone savage armed"及"moves in darkness"等字眼描寫neighbor這是成功的對比手法的運用。 詩中的wall除了字面上的牆以外，當然更象徵著各種人為的籓籬。有用的牆可以達到保護或隔離的目的，而無用的牆卻無疑的是有形的交通和人與人的情誼的阻 礙。 Speaker反對樹牆，而對於不得不補牆一事卻能淡然處之（II.9-12）。可見有形的牆還沒有無形的牆可怕。有形的牆還有"Something"來 推倒它；無形的，精神上的牆便只有待"Mending Wall"這種詩來催毀了。
http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/frost/section3.rhtml
Summary
A stone wall separates the speaker's property from his neighbor's. In spring, the two meet to walk the wall and jointly make repairs. The speaker sees no reason for the wall to be kept--there are no cows to be contained, just apple and pine trees. He does not believe in walls for the sake of walls. The neighbor resorts to an old adage: "Good fences make good neighbors." The speaker remains unconvinced and mischievously presses the neighbor to look beyond the old-fashioned folly of such reasoning. His neighbor will not be swayed. The speaker envisions his neighbor as a holdover from a justifiably outmoded era, a living example of a dark-age mentality. But the neighbor simply repeats the adage.
Form
Blank verse is the baseline meter of this poem, but few of the lines march along in blank verse's characteristic lock-step iambs, five abreast. Frost maintains five stressed syllables per line, but he varies the feet extensively to sustain the natural speech-like quality of the verse. There are no stanza breaks, obvious end-rhymes, or rhyming patterns, but many of the end-words share an assonance (e.g., wall, hill, balls, wall, and well sun, thing, stone, mean, line, and again or game, them, and him twice). Internal rhymes, too, are subtle, slanted, and conceivably coincidental. The vocabulary is all of a piece--no fancy words, all short (only one word, another, is of three syllables), all conversational--and this is perhaps why the words resonate so consummately with each other in sound and feel.
Commentary
I have a friend who, as a young girl, had to memorize this poem as punishment for some now-forgotten misbehavior. Forced memorization is never pleasant; still, this is a fine poem for recital. "Mending Wall" is sonorous, homey, wry--arch, even--yet serene; it is steeped in levels of meaning implied by its well-wrought metaphoric suggestions. These implications inspire numerous interpretations and make definitive readings suspect. Here are but a few things to think about as you reread the poem.
The image at the heart of "Mending Wall" is arresting: two men meeting on terms of civility and neighborliness to build a barrier between them. They do so out of tradition, out of habit. Yet the very earth conspires against them and makes their task Sisyphean. Sisyphus, you may recall, is the figure in Greek mythology condemned perpetually to push a boulder up a hill, only to have the boulder roll down again. These men push boulders back on top of the wall; yet just as inevitably, whether at the hand of hunters or sprites, or the frost and thaw of nature's invisible hand, the boulders tumble down again. Still, the neighbors persist. The poem, thus, seems to meditate conventionally on three grand themes: barrier-building (segregation, in the broadest sense of the word), the doomed nature of this enterprise, and our persistence in this activity regardless.
But, as we so often see when we look closely at Frost's best poems, what begins in folksy straightforwardness ends in complex ambiguity. The speaker would have us believe that there are two types of people: those who stubbornly insist on building superfluous walls (with cliches as their justification) and those who would dispense with this practice--wall-builders and wall-breakers. But are these impulses so easily separable? And what does the poem really say about the necessity of boundaries?
The speaker may scorn his neighbor's obstinate wall-building, may observe the activity with humorous detachment, but he himself goes to the wall at all times of the year to mend the damage done by hunters; it is the speaker who contacts the neighbor at wall-mending time to set the annual appointment. Which person, then, is the real wall-builder? The speaker says he sees no need for a wall here, but this implies that there may be a need for a wall elsewhere-- "where there are cows," for example. Yet the speaker must derive something, some use, some satisfaction, out of the exercise of wall-building, or why would he initiate it here? There is something in him that does love a wall, or at least the act of making a wall.
This wall-building act seems ancient, for it is described in ritual terms. It involves "spells" to counteract the "elves," and the neighbor appears a Stone-Age savage while he hoists and transports a boulder. Well, wall-building is ancient and enduring--the building of the first walls, both literal and figurative, marked the very foundation of society. Unless you are an absolute anarchist and do not mind livestock munching your lettuce, you probably recognize the need for literal boundaries. Figuratively, rules and laws are walls; justice is the process of wall-mending. The ritual of wall maintenance highlights the dual and complementary nature of human society: The rights of the individual (property boundaries, proper boundaries) are affirmed through the affirmation of other individuals' rights. And it demonstrates another benefit of community; for this communal act, this civic "game," offers a good excuse for the speaker to interact with his neighbor. Wall-building is social, both in the sense of "societal" and "sociable." What seems an act of anti-social self-confinement can, thus, ironically, be interpreted as a great social gesture. Perhaps the speaker does believe that good fences make good neighbors-- for again, it is he who initiates the wall-mending.
Of course, a little bit of mutual trust, communication, and goodwill would seem to achieve the same purpose between well-disposed neighbors--at least where there are no cows. And the poem says it twice: "something there is that does not love a wall." There is some intent and value in wall-breaking, and there is some powerful tendency toward this destruction. Can it be simply that wall-breaking creates the conditions that facilitate wall-building? Are the groundswells a call to community- building--nature's nudge toward concerted action? Or are they benevolent forces urging the demolition of traditional, small-minded boundaries? The poem does not resolve this question, and the narrator, who speaks for the groundswells but acts as a fence-builder, remains a contradiction.
Many of Frost's poems can be reasonably interpreted as commenting on the creative process; "Mending Wall" is no exception. On the basic level, we can find here a discussion of the construction-disruption duality of creativity. Creation is a positive act--a mending or a building. Even the most destructive-seeming creativity results in a change, the building of some new state of being: If you tear down an edifice, you create a new view for the folks living in the house across the way. Yet creation is also disruptive: If nothing else, it disrupts the status quo. Stated another way, disruption is creative: It is the impetus that leads directly, mysteriously (as with the groundswells), to creation. Does the stone wall embody this duality? In any case, there is something about "walking the line"--and building it, mending it, balancing each stone with equal parts skill and spell--that evokes the mysterious and laborious act of making poetry.
On a level more specific to the author, the question of boundaries and their worth is directly applicable to Frost's poetry. Barriers confine, but for some people they also encourage freedom and productivity by offering challenging frameworks within which to work. On principle, Frost did not write free verse. His creative process involved engaging poetic form (the rules, tradition, and boundaries--the walls--of the poetic world) and making it distinctly his own. By maintaining the tradition of formal poetry in unique ways, he was simultaneously a mender and breaker of walls.
A Minor Bird 小鳥
我只希望小鸟飞得远远， I have wished a bird would fly away，
不要竟日吱喳在我门前。 And not sing by my house all day；
我曾经在门口对它击掌， Have clapped my hands at him from the door，
似乎已不耐于鸟的歌唱。 When it seemed as if I could bear no more.
想来必是部份责任在我， The fault must partly have been in me，
鸟儿的鸣啭本无过错。 The bird was not to blame for his key.
当然我难免有点儿冒失， And of course there must be something wrong，
试想将任何的歌曲休止。 In wanting to silence any song.
Dayday:
The poet really presents an inverted view, unconventional but ture.
Everything one see in his blue day appears not pleasing to his eyes…even that vulnerable bird…
Dust of Snow 雪尘
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
一只乌鸦 The way a crow
抖落雪尘 Shook down on me
自铁杉枝桠撒我一身 From a hemlock tree
使我的心 Has given my heart
有了变化 A change of mood
一天的郁闷 And saved some part
次迭升华。 Of a day I had rued.
宋颖豪 译者注：这首诗的原文仅只一句，能以排列为二节六行，且形式整齐，语气盎然 ，不愧是大家之作。而译文虽略有变动，皆在传译其精髓。
Dayday:
宋颖豪厉害，连“郁闷”(rue)这样的词都给宋大爷给整出来了……佩服……
补充说明：
宋颖豪（本名宋广仁）一九三○年生，河南襄城人。文学硕士；曾服军旅达三十五年，并在各大学讲授美国文学、诗选、翻译等课程。早於四○年代後期即以念汝、 白圭、襄人、殷嗣等笔名发表诗作。嗣於五○年代中期乃转注於英美诗的译介，卓有优绩。著有《麦帅传》、海明威研究及中国现代史论文多篇。译有《诗经验 谈》、《美国诗选》、《水晶诗选》、艾略特的《诗选》及＜荒原＞等。现任《诗象》诗社社长及文协翻译委员会主任委员。
On Looking Up by Chance at the Constellations
1. You'll wait a long, long time for anything much
2. To happen in heaven beyond the floats of cloud
3. And the Northern Lights that run like tingling nerves.
4. The sun and moon get crossed, but they never touch,
5. Nor strike out fire from each other nor crash out loud.
6. The planets seem to interfere in their curves
7. But nothing ever happens, no harm is done.
8. We may as well go patiently on with our life,
9. And look elsewhere than to stars and moon and sun
10. For the shocks and changes we need to keep us sane.
11. It is true the longest drouth will end in rain,
12. The longest peace in China will end in strife.
13. Still it wouldn't reward the watcher to stay awake
14. In hopes of seeing the calm of heaven break
15. On his particular time and personal sight.
16. That calm seems certainly safe to last to-night.
Dayday:
“On Looking Up by Chance at the Constellations”
i was caught by this title at the first sight which reminded me of that star-strewn dome, blue, dark and infinite.
How long ago was my last time looking up?...…
Being staying on the run for too long? And turned blind to the Nature from which we can derive the greatest pleasure?
Unjustifiable…
The Secret Sits
1. We dance round in a ring and suppose,
2. But the Secret sits in the middle and knows.
密坐
1. 我們圍成一圈跳舞並推測,
2. 但秘密坐在中央且瞭然.
1. 我們永遠只能繞著未知,而樂於揣摩
2. 但是神秘存在於未知的核心,只有自己能領略本質
1. 我們圍成一個圓圈跳舞,猜測,
2. 而秘密坐在其中知曉一切.
Lodged
1. The rain to the wind said,
2. "You push and I'll pelt."
3. They so smote the garden bed
4. That the flowers actually knelt,
5. And lay lodged--though not dead.
6. I know how the flowers felt.
A Patch of Old Snow 一片殘雪
1. There's a patch of old snow in a corner
2. That I should have guessed
3. Was a blow-away paper the rain
4. Had brought to rest.
5. It is speckled with grime as if
6. Small print overspread it,
7. The news of a day I've forgotten—
8. If I ever read it.
另一个译本:
Nothing Gold Can Stay(黃金事物難久留)
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
自然的初綠是為金,
她這種色彩最難存.
她的新葉像朵花;
但也只能保剎那.
之後葉復褪為葉.
同理伊甸淪悲切,
同理清晨沉為晝.
黃金事物難久留.
(彭鏡禧 夏燕生 譯)
Design--by Rober Frost
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white
On a white heal-all, holding up a moth
Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth--
Assorted characters of death and blight
Mixed ready to begin the morning right
Like the ingredients of a witches' broth--
A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth
And dead wings carried like a paper kite.
What had that flower to do with being white
The wayside blue and innocent heal-all
What brought the kindred spider to that height
Then steered the white moth thither in the night
What but design of darkness to appall
If design govern in a thing so small
heal-all-- a plant, normally with blue blossoms, reputed
to have healing powers.
雪夜林畔小驻
傅洛帛
应识谁家林，
小屋卧小村。
安知余伫此，
雪夜观雪林。
驻斯马诧然，
四顾无人烟。
林湖两相静，
此岁今夕暗。
铃音飘然起，
轻询胡不归。
和风悄然过，
絮雪带声飞。
可怜幽邃林，
但惜守誓信。
路迢安能寝，
路迢安能寝。
弗罗斯特诗歌比喻的喻体
摘要：弗罗斯特诗歌中比喻的喻体丰富多彩，有以自然中的现象、景观、物产、动物，也有以日常生活中的农具、餐具、女性美、人体、宗教和神话传说为喻体的。这些喻体折射出诗人对自然、对生活的热爱和个人的痛苦经历以及宗教对西方人生活的影响等。
关键词：喻体；自然；生活；宗教
Metaphorical Objects in Frost’s Poetry
Abstract: In Frost’s poetry, there are various metaphorical objects, such as natural scenery, phenomenon, animals and flowers in nature, others are closely associated with life, farm tools, food, women’s beauty, human body, religion and mythology, etc.. All these reflect the poet’s love for nature and life, his sad experience in life and the influence religion exerted upon western people’s daily life.
Key words: metaphorical objects; nature; life; religion
罗伯特•弗罗斯特（Robert Frost, 1874-1963）是20世纪美国最杰出的诗人之一。他的诗歌语言质朴、清新、近乎口语化，但折射出真理的光辉。这与他诗歌中大量使用的比喻是分不开的。他说过：“诗始于普通的隐喻，巧妙的隐喻和‘高雅’的隐喻，适于我们所拥有的最深刻的思想。”[1]他还说过：“我发现自己对诗歌还有不少谈论，但其中最重要的是谈隐喻，即指东说西，以此述彼，隐秘的欢欣。诗简直就是由隐喻构成。”[2]从某种意义上讲，比喻构筑起弗罗斯特诗歌结构的有机张力，使其诗歌语言清新活泼，生动形象，富于哲理，丰富了诗歌的表达力，增强了诗歌语言的感染力，增添了他文笔的光彩。
众所周知，弗罗斯特常被誉为自然诗人。他创作了许多流传的自然诗篇如《雪夜在林边停留》（Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening）、《金色光华难常驻》（Nothing Gold Can Stay）、《荒野》（Desert Places）、《既不远，也不深》(Neither out Far nor in Deep)等。他歌唱大自然中的山川湖泊、日月星辰、海浪沙滩、花木鸟虫。他喜欢独自漫步在静静的夜空下、树林中、草地上，凝视美丽幽静的星空，倾听林中鸟儿的争鸣，采撷朵朵花草。他曾在《进入自我》一诗中明确宣称对自然的眷恋和热爱：“我的心愿”之一是那黑沉沉的树木，那古朴苍劲、柔风难吹进的树林。 [3]大自然的一草一木能使诗人忘掉不快的现实、寒冷的冬季、内心的忧伤和痛苦。一只乌鸦也能给诗人带来欢欣、希望，使诗人精神振奋。他在《雪尘》一诗中写道：“一只乌鸦/从一颗铁杉树上把雪尘抖落到/我身上的方式//已使我抑郁的心情/为之一振/并从我懊悔的一天中/挽回了一部分。”由于诗人酷爱自然，大自然美丽的景观、现象、丰富的物产，初升的太阳，落日的余晖，风霜雪雨，珍珠宝石，尘土卵石不仅成为他咏歌的主题，也成了他诗歌比喻的喻体。在诗人看来，一块小小的划地也弥足珍贵，价值连城，也像太阳那样使大自然中的万事万物充满生机和活力，孕育一切生命。诗人写道：“一片浸透水的草地，/小如宝石，形如太阳，/一片圆形的草地，不比周围的树林宽敞”（《红朱兰》）。大自然的尘土也变成金灿灿的的黄金：“所有被大风高高扬起的灰尘/在落日余辉中显得都像黄金”（《漫天黄金》）。春回大地之时，“大自然的新绿珍贵如金”（《金色光华难常驻》）。黎明前的雨点像珠宝：“有人形容指晓前的雨点像珍珠，/天亮后在阳光照耀下则变成钻石”（《谷间鸟鸣》）。呼吸也像大自然中的微风：“太阳烤热的山坡使我的脸发烧，/我的呼吸像微风使野花摇头，/我可以闻闻泥土和草木的气息，/可以从蚁穴洞口看里面的蚂蚁。”（《地利》）
弗罗斯特一生历尽艰辛和痛苦，他幼年丧父，中年丧妻，老年丧子（女）。成名后的弗罗斯特受聘于多所大学，经党外出读诗和演讲，“经常拖着病体疲惫不堪地回家。”[4]他诗歌中常常出现与孤独、绝望、死亡等关联的意象如冬、雪、冰、霜、枯叶等。生活的艰辛，人世的沧桑使诗人对生活已感到厌倦，就像在树林中迷路的旅行者一样，蛛丝缠面，满脸烧伤，一只眼睛还因擦伤而在流泪。诗人精神上肉体上的痛苦已不堪忍受，他要借爬白桦树寻找一条出路，一条通向天国的道路，离开人世间一段时间：“我喜欢凭着爬一颗白桦树离去，/攀着黑色树枝沿雪白的树干上天”（《白桦树》）。
因此，弗罗斯特常常以凋零的玫瑰、干枯的花朵等以喻体以映衬孤独、悲哀、寂寞的内心世界。《风暴之歌》中的蜜蜂也不再采撷花草，林中的鸟儿也停止了歌唱。诗人写道：“森林的歌声全都被撕碎，就像/易遭摧残的野玫瑰凋零。”那被大火烧毁的房子已化为灰烬，只剩下根烟囱孑然独立， “活像四周掉光了花瓣的花蕊。”（《熟悉乡下事之必要》）诗人已厌倦了生活：“那是在我厌倦了思考的时候，/这时生活太像一座没有路的树林，/你的脸因撞上蜘蛛网而发痒发烧，/你的一只眼睛在流泪，因为一根/小树枝在它睁着时抽了它一下。”（《白桦林》）《春潭》以大自然顽强的生命力，衬托出人类的卑微和渺小：“春潭虽掩蔽在浓密的树林，/却依然能映出无暇的蓝天，/像潭边野花一样瑟瑟颤栗，/也会像野花一样很快枯干。”《意志》呈现给读者一幅可怕的画面：白色蜘蛛在白色万灵草上抓住一只飞蛾，“蜘蛛像雪花莲，小花儿像浮沫，/飞蛾垂死的翅膀则像一纸风筝。”而潘的“皮肤、毛发和眼睛都是灰色，/是墙头上苔藓的那种灰色——”（《潘与我们在一起》）。
由于诗人亲近自然，自然界中的动物也成了他诗歌中比喻的喻体。自然界中的落叶“像有野兔在逃窜， /像有野鹿在逃循。”（《收落叶》）一个暴风雨之夜，诗人冒着雪赶回家，“雪化成冰水顺着他的脖子直往下流，/像床上一只淘气的猫吮吸他的气息。”（《固执的回归》）面朗伸开的双臂“像翅膀张开”（《布朗下山》）。《被骚扰的花》一诗中的他：“每吐出一个字/他的嘴唇都吮吸一下，/这种努力使他透不过气来，/就像是老虎含着根骨头。”
二
弗罗斯特的人生哲学具有悖论性。一方面，生活的艰辛与磨难，使他产生了厌倦情绪。另一方面，他人为，生活中有许多美好的东西值得追求，因此，生活又值得眷恋。没有对大自然的热爱，便没有对人类、对生活的热爱。对自然的热爱，进而使他热爱生活。正是对自然对生活和对人类的热爱促使他拿起诗笔创作了许多优美的自然诗篇。他在《生存考验》一诗中写道：“上帝把人世生存的短暂的梦/描绘得非常完满，充满温情。”诗人指出，人生虽然苦短，但生活中充满温情，值得人去追求，这充分表明诗人对生活的热爱和对美好生活的向往和憧憬。他对生活的热爱使他憎恨毁灭人类的力量 ——冰与火，仇恨和欲望的象征。《冰与火》表露出诗人对未来世界的担忧，充分表达了诗人对生活，对人类的眷恋之情。由于弗罗斯特熟谙生活，热爱生活，他诗歌中以生活为喻体的比喻也构成了他诗歌比喻的重要部分，这些包括以现实生活中的用具、农具、餐具为喻体的比喻。《士兵》中“他就像那柄掷出后坠地的投枪， /如今静静躺在地里沾露生锈，/但枪尖仍锋利像在耕地的犁头。”那些在雾中噪鸣的雨蛙“就像朦胧雪地里隐约的雪橇铃声”（《雨蛙溪》）。诗人“用铁锹去铲落叶，/科就像用铁勺，/成包成袋的落叶/却像气球般轻飘。”（《收落叶》）
弗罗斯特还以食物作为喻体。波士顿以北布满石块的农场里，石块形状各异，“石块有的像雨包，/有的呈球状”（《补墙》）。破门而入的泥石流“就像没有发酵的面团”（《关于消顶扩基》）。一块小小的卵石也能使诗人动心，精神振奋，虽然对于别人它一文不值：“我经营着一片遍地卵石的牧场，/卵石像满满一篮鸡蛋使人动心”（《咏家乡的卵石》）。他还以文艺作为喻体。《布朗下山》这样写布朗滑行下山的动作：“他就像表演旋转舞似的滑行，/这种姿态颇有尊严和风度。”《新罕布什尔》中那个做买卖刚回来的家伙“站在他那个开着门的牧口棚里，/像个孤独的演员在昏暗的舞台上”。诗人猜想一堆残雪是被风刮走的一张报纸：“雪堆上有点点污迹，像是/报上小小的铅字，/像我已忘记的某天的新闻 —/如果我读过它的话。”（《一堆残雪》）诗人也要用人体做为比喻的喻体。《新罕布什尔》中的那个伐木队长为了躲避原木：“他拼命要躲开一根像一条手臂/ 伸向天空要砸断他脊梁的原木”。那条城中的小溪则“像手臂环抱着农舍”（《城中小溪》）。
诗人揉自然与生活为一体的比喻还体现在他以女性，尤其女性之美为喻体。沼泽地里有各种各样的野花“每一种都像一张少女的脸”（《在一条山谷里》）。那树干压弯、树叶垂地的白桦树被比作匍匐在草地上的少女，长发倒垂，正在阳光下吹晒秀发。诗人写道：“在以后的岁月里，你会在树林中/看见它们树干弯曲，树叶垂地，/就像姑娘们手脚并用叭在地上/任洗过的头发散在头上让太阳晒干。”（《白桦树》）
在英美社会发展中，宗教和神话都曾产生过相当大的影响。基督教和古希腊古罗马的神话传说是英语文化不可分割的一部分，对英语文化的形成和发展起了关键性的作用。基督教是英美社会的主要精神支柱，因此，它影响到日常生活的各个方面。弗罗斯特诗中以宗教和神话传说为喻体的比喻颇多。诗中人的树林，那些小小的冷杉树“活像一座座耸着尖塔的教堂”（《圣诞树——一封寄给亲友的圣诞贺涵》）。《雪》一诗中的“他”十分重要，因为“他一走这里静得像空荡荡的教堂”。那些白人的祖先“就像那些为亚当的子孙娶妻的祖先”（《新罕布什尔》）。诗人在夏目里每每经过那鸟儿栖息的地方，必定驻足，抬头仰望，因为“一只小鸟放开美妙歌喉”，/如天使一般在树上啁啾。（《觅鸟，在冬日黄昏》）诗人的自言自语“像是在祈祷”（《试车》）。一只白色蜘蛛在白色万灵草上抓住一只飞蛾“与死亡和枯萎相称相配的特征/混合在一起正好准备迎接清晨，/就像一个女巫汤锅里加的配料”（《意志》）。《取水》中的两位来树林提水的人，一进树林便停止，“像躲开月神而匿的地神”。《夜空彩虹》中的诗中人在一个有雾的晚上，走下山冈，穿过刚刚被雨淋过的田野和树篱回家的途中，发现一道使人困惑的光，“就像古罗马人认为他们在孟菲斯/从高地上见过的那种奇异的光芒——”。紫边兰那“白得像幽灵的花蕾”（《寻找紫边兰》）使人想到孤独和死亡。《等待》中的诗中人把自己比做幽灵：“有些什么会入梦，当我像一个幽灵/飘过那些匆匆垛成的高高的草堆”。《星星》一诗中，星星代表了自然的眼睛。大自然显得十分冷漠，无视人类的存在：“然而既无爱心也无仇恨，/星星就像弥涅瓦雕像/那些雪白的大理石眼睛，/有眼无珠，张目亦盲。”
除此之外，弗罗斯特诗中，还有其它种类的喻体。《补墙》中那位力主补墙者“一只手抓紧一块石头，就像/旧石器时代的野蛮人手持武器一样。 / 我觉得他仿佛进入了一片黑暗，/那黑暗不仅仅因树阴遮蔽了目光。”《仆人们的仆人》中那位女仆难以表达自己的情感，“我不能表露自己的感情，就像/我不能提高嗓门或不想抬手一样”。在理发店里与理发师聊天的渔夫的“船停泊在洒满阳光的草坪上，/满船的花草都已经长到舷缘，/就像它当年从乔治洲返航，/满载着鳕鱼乘风破浪把家还。”（《花船》）当夜幕降临，诗中人窗前的树“梦一般迷蒙的树梢拔地而起，/高高树冠弥漫在半天云里”（《我窗前的树》）。
Robert Frost, Poet
◇Born: 26 March 1874
◆Birthplace: San Francisco, California
◇Died: 29 January 1963
◆Best Known As: American poet who wrote "The Road Not Taken"
The poetry of Robert Frost combined pastoral imagery with solitary philosophical themes and was often associated with rural New England. Frost was one of the most popular poets in America during his lifetime and was frequently called the country's unofficial poet laureate. He was farming in Derry, New Hampshire when, at the age of 38, he sold the farm, uprooted his family and moved to England, where he devoted himself to his poetry. His first two books of verse, A Boy's Will (1913) and North of Boston (1914), were immediate successes. In 1915 he returned to the United States and continued to publish poems that were both popular and critical successes. His poems include "Mending Wall" ("good fences make good neighbors"), "Birches," "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" ("Whose woods these are I think I know"), and "The Road Not Taken." Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize four times: in 1924, 1931, 1937 and 1943. He also served as "Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress" from 1958-59; that position was renamed as "Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry" in 1986.
Frost read his poem "The Gift Outright" at the 1961 inauguration of John F. Kennedy... Frost preferred traditional rhyme and meter in poetry; his famous dismissal of free verse was, "I'd just as soon play tennis with the net down."
【FOUR GOOD LINKS】
☆The Robert Frost Web Page
http://www.robertfrost.org/indexgood.html
Biography, interviews and select poems
★Robert Frost: America's Poet
http://www.ketzle.com/frost/
Timeline biography and several of his poems
☆A Frost Bouquet
http://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/frost/home.html
Terrific exhibit from the University of Virginia
★Frost in The Atlantic Monthly
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/199604u/frost-intro
1996 profile that includes poems and readings
弗罗斯特(Robert Frost)(1874～1963)美国诗人。1874年3月26日生于美国西部的旧金山。他11岁丧父，后随母亲迁居东北部的新英格兰。此后，他就与那块土地结下了不解之缘。弗罗斯特16岁开始写诗，20岁时正式发表第一首诗歌。他勤奋笔耕，一生中共出了10多本诗集，其中主要的有《波士顿以北》(1914)，《山间》(1916)，《新罕布什尔》(1923)，《西流的小溪》(1928)，《见证树》(1942)以及《林间空地》(1962)等。弗罗斯特的诗可分为两大类：抒情短诗和戏剧性较强的叙事诗，两者都脍炙人口。弗罗斯特的抒情诗主要描写了大自然和农民，尤其是新英格兰的景色和北方的农民。这些诗形象而生动，具有很强的感染力，深受各层次读者的欢迎。他的叙事诗一般都格调低沉，体现了诗人思想和性格中阴郁的一面。弗罗斯特的世界观是比较复杂的，他把世界看成是一个善与恶的混合体。因此，他的诗一方面描写了大自然的美和自然对人类的恩惠，另一方面也写了其破坏力以及给人类带来的不幸和灾难。弗罗斯特诗歌风格上的一个最大特点是朴素无华，含义隽永，寓深刻的思考和哲理于平淡无奇的内容和简洁朴实的诗句之中。这既是弗罗斯特的艺术追求，也是他事业成功的秘密所在。
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening (1923)
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
=====================================================
译文1：雪夜林前小驻
谁之丛林我已知晓
村中他家难以寻找
他难见我在此滞留
观望林莽银装素袍
我的爱马想必惊讶
为何呆在荒林野郊
左有冰湖右有密林
更在如此漆黑之宵
轻轻振响颈上铜铃
询问是否其中有错
雪夜荒原万籁俱静
惟有寒风伴着落雪
丛林迷人幽暗深远
可我早已许下诺言
路迢途远岂敢酣眠
路迢途远岂敢酣眠
这首《雪夜林前小驻》所描写的情景不用解释，但它后面的情趣、哲理、魅力，需要细细品位。我独自站在树林边沿，里面有一种东西在吸引我，但不能光听内心世界的召唤，我还要许多世间的约会、责任，“路迢途远岂敢酣眠”，这里的“眠”既是陶醉，又是安静，或是心灵的平静。一个情景，引起人无限遐想，每个人会根据自己的经历体会无数个生活背后的韵味。
=====================================================
译文2：雪夜林畔小驻
(译)余光中
想来我认识这座森林，
林主的庄宅就在邻村,
却不会见我在此驻马，
看他林中积雪的美景。
我的小马一定颇惊讶：
四望不见有什么农家，
偏是一年最暗的黄昏，
寒林和冰湖之间停下。
它摇一摇身上的串铃，
问我这地方该不该停。
此外只有轻风拂雪片，
再也听不见其他声音。
森林又暗又深真可羡，
但我还要守一些诺言，
还要赶多少路才安眠，
还要赶多少路才安眠。
=====================================================
（四十才出名的）弗洛斯特对自己的要求是清醒与独立。对他而言，诗是“刹那之间的免于混乱”。当众流东趋而入海，他宁可做西行的溪水，保持自我。弗洛斯特的人生态度，是古典主义的兼容并包，行乎中庸之道，对生命的矛盾淡然受之，而且加以调和。他对人间也有种种不满，但他认为人间仍是最好的去处；他说他和世界的争执不过是“情人的吵架”。弗洛斯特真是一位人世间的诗人，嘴里埋怨着，心里却热爱着。在名诗《赤杨树》结尾时，他说：
我真想离开世界一阵子，
然后再回来，从头开始。
但愿命运莫故意会错意，
只偿我半个愿望，把我抓走，
一去不回头。用情该用在人间：
想不出有哪里日子更好过。
要我过我情愿爬赤杨树，
攀黑枝顺着雪白的树干，
向天国，直到树身盛不住，
只好垂下梢顶放我下地来。
弗在诗中暗示，少年应有理想，但理想只是现实的延伸，有其极限。到了极限，自然要重回现实来，再认人生。（余光中）
诗要“兴于喜悦，而终于彻悟”——弗洛斯特
Nothing Gold Can Stay
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
1. Nature's first green is gold,
2. Her hardest hue to hold.
3. Her early leaf's a flower;
4. But only so an hour.
5. Then leaf subsides to leaf.
6. So Eden sank to grief,
7. So dawn goes down to day.
8. Nothing gold can stay.
没有最美好的东西长久不变
——美国诗人罗伯特.弗罗斯特
自然界的第一件东西宝贵如金子一般，
但是极难永远保持不变。
她的第一片叶如同花儿，
但只会停留瞬间。
叶落叶生最常见。
难怪乐极生悲，
黎明发展下去是白天。
没有最美好的东西长久不变
岁月流金
宜人香色最难存。
丝丝细叶美如葩，
少倾迷失其芳华。
绿叶消溶于流光，
乐园沉沦多感伤。
黎明没入平凡日，
美景终会随风逝。
--罗伯特 .弗洛斯特
黄金之物不久全 Nothing Gold Can Stay
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
作者：宋颖豪
自然的新绿是金， Nature's first green is gold，
鲜美色彩难保存。 Her hardest hue to hold.
初发叶芽即是花； Her early leaf's a flower；
仅能持续一刹那。 But only an hour.
遂而新芽长成叶。 Then leaf subsides to leaf.
伊甸顿然陷悲切， So Eden sank to grief，
曙晓瞬已大白天。 So dawn goes down to day.
黄金之物不久全。 Nothing gold can stay.
黃金事物難久留
1. 自然的初綠是為金,
2. 她這種色彩最難存.
3. 她的新葉像朵花;
4. 但也只能保剎那.
5. 之後葉復褪為葉.
6. 同理伊甸淪悲切,
7. 同理清晨沉為晝.
8. 黃金事物難久留.
(彭鏡禧 夏燕生 譯)
黄金时代倍难留
大自然的新绿是黄金，
可叹难持久！
大自然的初叶是鲜花，
可叹一时休。
终于落木萧萧下，
伊甸满园愁，
朝晖化白昼，
黄金时代倍难留。
The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
The Road Not Taken 沒走的路
1. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
2. And sorry I could not travel both
3. And be one traveler, long I stood
4. And looked down one as far as I could
5. To where it bent in the undergrowth;
6. Then took the other, as just as fair,
7. And having perhaps the better claim,
8. Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
9. Though as for that the passing there
10. Had worn them really about the same,
11. And both that morning equally lay
12. In leaves no step had trodden black.
13. Oh, I kept the first for another day!
14. Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
15. I doubted if I should ever come back.
16. I shall be telling this with a sigh
17. Somewhere ages and ages hence:
18. Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
19. I took the one less traveled by,
20. And that has made all the difference.
1. 兩條路在黃樹林裡分叉,
2. 但可惜我不能兩條都走
3. 身為旅者,我佇立良久
4. 我看一條路盡可能看得遠
5. 直到它轉進樹叢內;
6. 然後再看另一條,幾乎一樣,
7. 但說不定更好,
8. 因綠草如茵邀人踩;
9. 雖然在那路口
10. 踩過的痕跡幾乎一樣,
11. 在那早晨同樣並列在
12. 未被踩過的葉子下.
13. 喔,我保留第一條給改天走!
14. 雖知道一路走下去又接著路,
15. 我懷疑我是否該回頭.
16. 我將歎息著述說這事
17. 在此很久很久後某時:
18. 兩條路在樹林內分叉,而我--
19. 我選擇了較少人走的,
20. 而這造成了所有的差別.
Neuro 黃學仁 譯;
1. 在黃樹林裡有兩條岔路
2. 遺憾的是我無法兩條都走
3. 身為一個路人,我佇立良久
4. 我使勁地眺望其一
5. 它蜿蜒的沒入草叢裡
6. 爾後,我也同樣努力的眺望了另一條路
7. 也許我獲得比較強力的支撐點
8. 因為那條路花草濃密，了無人跡;
9. 兩路末端相通，
10. 那麼結局便無差別。
11. 那天早上兩條路同樣的橫在眼前
12. 落葉飄飛,林間乏人可問
13. 哦,我把第一條路保留著,改天再走吧!
14. 縱然知道如何再回到這條路上來,
15. 我不敢說我會再回來
16. 多少年後，我將喟然興嘆，
17. 從前從前在某處:
18. 樹林裡有兩條岔路,而我--
19. 我選擇了一條比較少人走的
20. 造成完全不同的結果.
(huanyin 譯; 2005-03-12)
1. 兩條路在黃色的樹林間叉開，
2. 可惜我不能走兩條路。
3. 我這個過客久久徘徊，
4. 極目望去，一條路在遠處，
5. 蜿蜒地進入樹林荒蕪；
6. 我向另一條路望去，同樣平坦，
7. 也許它更值得行走，
8. 因為它長滿茸茸綠草，等待人們的踐踏；
9. 雖然它也已紛亂，
10. 行人在這裡過往奔沓。
11. 那天清晨，兩條路上覆滿樹葉，
12. 沒有腳步把它們踏碎。
13. 啊，哪一天我將走第一條路！
14. 雖然我知道條條路相接，
15. 我仍懷疑是否仍能走回原路。
16. 我將把這事告訴別人，
17. 一面深深嘆息。
18. 樹林中有兩股岔道，
19. 而我走的那條路行人稀少，
20. 這就造成了一切的差異。
1. 黃樹林裡分叉兩條路，
2. 只可惜我不能都踏行。
3. 我，單獨的旅人，佇立良久，
4. 極目眺望一條路的盡頭，
5. 看它隱沒在叢林深處。
6. 於是我選擇了另一條路，
7. 一樣平直，也許更值得，
8. 因為青草茵茵，還未被踏過，
9. 若有過往人蹤，
10. 路的狀況會相差無幾。
11. 那天早晨，兩條路都覆蓋在枯葉下，
12. 沒有踐踏的污痕：
13. 啊，原先那條路留給另一天吧！
14. 明知一條路會引出另一條路，
15. 我懷疑我是否會回到原處。
16. 在許多許多年以後，在某處，
17. 我會輕輕歎息說：
18. 黃樹林裡分叉兩條路，而我，
19. 我選擇了較少人跡的一條，
20. 使得一切多麼地不同。
未選擇的路
1. 黃葉林中出條岔路，
2. 無奈一人難於兼顧，
3. 順著一條婉蜒小路，
4. 久久佇立極目遠眺，
5. 只見小徑拐進灌木。
6. 接著選擇了另一條，
7. 同樣清楚似乎更好，
8. 引人踩踏鋪滿茂草，
9. 踏在其間難分彼此，
10. 儘管真有兩條道。
11. 清晨裏躺著兩條路，
12. 一樣葉被無人踏髒，
13. 願將第一條來日補，
14. 但知條條相連遠途，
15. 懷疑日後怎能回返。
16. 在很久以後某一地，
17. 我將歎息訴說於人，
18. 兩路岔開在樹林裏，
19. 我選的那條足跡稀，
20. 而一切差別由此起。
1. 金色樹林分兩條岔路
2. 遺憾未能兩者都試
3. 身為旅者，我駐足良久
4. 遠眺其中一條
5. 直到山路消失灌木叢中
6. 然後，踏上另外一條，似乎差不多
7. 或許更佳美之徑
8. 因綠草如蔭引人上路
9. 然而若有過往人蹤
10. 兩條路況恐怕相差無幾
11. 當日清晨，兩條道路皆是
12. 滿佈落葉無人踐踏
13. 唉，留著第一條改天再走吧！
14. 其實我何等明白：一路通往一路
15. 豈容有回頭機會
16. 多年之後某個時候
17. 帶著一聲歎息，我要告訴你：
18. 樹林裡分兩條岔路，而我——
19. 選擇了人煙較少的那條
20. 結果是如此不同
沒有選中的路
1. 黃色的樹林中分出兩條道，
2. 可惜我不能兩條都選。
3. 一人豈能同行兩條道，
4. 我久立而難前。
5. 放眼朝一條道望去，
6. 直到轉角擋住了視野。
7. 再看第二條路，同樣佳美，
8. 也許還有更好的得著，
9. 因它草綠待踏。
10. 儘管那另一條道，
11. 差不多同樣候人踏上。
12. 那日清晨兩條路同在眼前
13. 都是落葉未經腳步踏
14. 哦，下一次再試那第一條吧！
15. 但心裡深知一路通一路，越踏越深，
16. 我疑惑應否回返原地。
17. 我會以嘆息傳告此舉
18. 在許久、許久的未來：
19. 兩條道在樹林中分叉而出，我－－
20. 我選中了那條少人行走的路，
21. 它因此帶來了全然不同的結局。
(林潔 譯)
沒有走的路
1. 黃樹林裡岔開兩條路
2. 很遺憾我不能都涉足
3. 我孤單地站立良久
4. 向其中一條極目望去
5. 看它彎沒在林蔭的深處
6. 然後走另一條 同樣清幽
7. 也許還多些魅力：
8. 那綠草茵茵似乎更盼望人跡
9. 但其實這兩條路的過況
10. 也沒有那麼大的差異
11. 那個早晨兩條路躺在前面
12. 落葉都還沒有遭污跡踏踐
13. 啊！第一條改天再走吧！
14. 只是來路遙遙地相接
15. 我恐怕無法再回到原點
16. 多年後的某時某地
17. 我回憶此刻將輕聲嘆息：
18. 樹林裏岔開兩條路 而我－
19. 我走了人跡較少的那一條
20. 因此有了完全不同的人生
(尤克強譯)
Robert Frost作詩的一個特點便是善於運用眼前看似平淡無奇的瑣事，來表達一個深刻的思想或哲理。換言之，他長於運用具體的事物以說明抽象的概念，使讀者易於接受和瞭解。本詩便是一個最好的例子。
在本詩裡，詩人回顧往日，在他人生的旅途中曾遭遇岔道的困擾，兩條叉路擺在眼前，任擇其一，魚與熊掌勢難得兼。他跓立路口，沉思良久，放眼望去，只是其中 一條的盡頭淹沒在叢林裡，又見另一條綠草如茵，杳無人跡，於是走上了這條自認少人行走的路。但經他一走，也免難足跡斑斑了。既走上了這條路，還冀望來日再 走那條，但又自知人生旅途如大江東去，勢難折回。在此，詩人表現了一絲淡淡的懊悔，對這種人力不可挽回的事，也沒奈之何。
再遙想未來，自己將嘆一口氣，把這故事重提，當時選擇了這條人跡鮮稀之途，才有今日的種種。
本詩是以某樹林為背景，但卻可轉用到任何地點和任何時間上去。
詩人在追憶昔日可能發生而未發生的事，當時的一個決定便影響後來的一切。
這是人人在日常生活 中都會遭遇的難題，作者以簡明的筆調，生動的畫面說明了這個事實。
用字平實，共分為四節，每節押韻很工整，都依×○××○這樣的韻型寫成。
註:
19 行為何說 took the one "less" traveled by ?
之前明明是說:
And looked down one as far as I could (他可是有先盤算一下的)
To where it bent in the undergrowth; (先觀察了第一條路直看到路的盡頭)
Then took the other, as just as fair, 第二條路也幾乎一樣
And having perhaps the better claim, 但甚至他還選了比較有利的(第二條路)
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same 不過其實差不多
And both that morning equally lay 兩邊一樣
所以, 當他說
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence: 多年以後,我將會這麼說:
...
I took the one less traveled by, (我選擇了少人走的)
所以表示,他準備到時要 吹牛
(騙那些後生小子 - 就是讀他的詩的人啦-不要笑,就是你 :)
老傢伙在講故事給那些後生小伙子,騙得他們一愣一愣的,
大家還都信以為真 - 到處引用
"小子們~, 你們看,我當初就是故意選那個冷門的,特立的,困難的,沒人要去的,...,才有今日"
- 他哪有~...
"And having perhaps the better claim," 他實際是選了比較有利的(第二條路)
這(本)是作者幽默處 :)
讀者不可不查 :)
(但,竊以為,大家都被他這將來準備老來膨風話給騙了:)
(啊~ 舉世滔滔 獨我看破這(未來的老)詩人愛說笑 :)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening 雪夜駐馬林畔
1. Whose woods these are I think I know.
2. His house is in the village, though;
3. He will not see me stopping here
4. To watch his woods fill up with snow.
5. My little horse must think it queer
6. To stop without a farmhouse near
7. Between the woods and frozen lake
8. The darkest evening of the year.
9. He gives his harness bells a shake
10. To ask if there is some mistake.
11. The only other sound's the sweep
12. Of easy wind and downy flake.
13. The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
14. But I have promises to keep,
15. And miles to go before I sleep,
16. And miles to go before I sleep.
1. 這是誰家森林,我想我懂.
2. 雖然他的房子是在村中;
3. 他不會看見我駐馬於此
4. 觀望他的森林積雪重重.
5. 我的馬兒一定認為奇異
6. 駐步於此近無農舍之地
7. 在這森林與那冰湖中間
8. 一年之中最黑暗的夜裡.
9. 牠把韁轡上配鈴撳一撳
10. 探問會不會有什麼錯亂.
11. 此外悄然更無其他聲息
12. 除了微風與柔雪的拂拌.
13. 森林誠然可愛,幽暗深邃.
14. 但我還要謹守一些約誓,
15. 還要走好幾里路才入睡,
16. 還要走好幾里路才入睡.
(施潁洲 譯)
一、 類型(Genre)
這首詩的背景有原野、森林、湖泊、村莊，與農舍。此外還有雪片紛飛著的雪景。主述人乘著小馬車，路過這樣一個引人入勝的地方，情不自禁的停下來，欣賞黃昏時刻大自然的美景。陶醉在這樣的美景之中，雖然依依不捨，但卻又不得不離開，繼續他的行程。
這首詩的背景充滿田園詩(pastoral poetry)的風格，內容在發抒主述人心中矛盾的情緒，因此這首詩又可以說是一首田園式的抒情詩(pastoral lyric poem)。從這首詩中象徵的意義上看來，這是一首有思想的詩(a poem of idea)，表現出主述人對自然與人生的看法，其間隱約還帶有說教(didactic)的意味。
二、 主題(Theme)
表面上，我們覺得主述人只是在描寫森林中美麗的雪景，發抒個人心中矛盾情緒。通常我們認為在兩種不同的欲望同時發生時，便會產生矛盾的情緒。主述人來到森 林處，一方面被美景所吸引，想要探究自然的神秘；一方面他還有不得不做的事情。詩中主述人說得很清楚，停下馬來是因為"To watch the woods fill up with snow"。主述人心中為何會有矛盾的情緒呢！他說："But I have promises to keep"。簡言之，主述人想要表達的就是「矛盾情緒」的概念。從象徵的觀點上來看這首詩的意義便更深長了，因為主述人心中的小衝突(small conflict)象徵著人生際遇中許多的大衝突(large conflict)。主述人好像在暗示"promises"很重要，我們無法永遠沉醉在美的懷抱之中，所以說這首詩內容上有點說教意味，但並未被清楚的表 達出來。
三、象徵與對比(Symbols and Contrast)
詩中最明顯的象徵與對比便是"woods"和"snow"。森林可能象徵自然的神秘；雪可能象徵純潔，崇高等等。兩者之間正好構成強烈的對比。第一節中， 主述人說他停下馬來是"To watch the woods fill up with snow."，這句話彷彿是在告訴我們神秘的自然表面時常蓋著一層看似單純的東西；表面上看起來是"lovely"，事實上卻是"dark and deep"（第十三行）。"lovely"和"dark and deep"便是象徵「善」與惡或「單純」與「複雜」式的對比。最後主述人像是在感嘆著想要去探究那"dark and deep"中的神秘是不大可能，因為人生中要做的事情著實太多了。
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
最後一行的"sleep"可能象徵著「死亡」。這便是這首詩更深一層的意義。同時說明了作者對自然的態度。
四、聲響與意義(Sound and Sense)
一首好詩的聲韻效果必與意義有下可分的關係。這首詩的韻律就是這個樣子，非常有規律。全詩共分四節(stanzas)，每節各四行(lines)，每一行 都是很規律的抑揚四步格 (iambic tretrameter)。押韻(rhyme)除最後一節外也都是很有規律的，即 /aaba/bbcb/ccdc/dddd/節奏的單調規律情形正可用來表達日常生活的缺乏變化。作者似乎故意在最後的一節破壞 /aaba/bbcb/ccdc/dded/的循環韻律，來表現主述人被森林美景所吸引，因而主述人規律的生活引起了變化，並使主述人平靜的內心產生矛盾 的情緒。這首詩被認為是一首好詩，這或許是其中的原因之一。
Mending Wall
by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
1. Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
2. That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
3. And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
4. And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
5. The work of hunters is another thing:
6. I have come after them and made repair
7. Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
8. But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
9. To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
10. No one has seen them made or heard them made,
11. But at spring mending-time we find them there.
12. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
13. And on a day we meet to walk the line
14. And set the wall between us once again.
15. We keep the wall between us as we go.
16. To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
17. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
18. We have to use a spell to make them balance:
19. 'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'
20. We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
21. Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
22. One on a side. It comes to little more:
23. There where it is we do not need the wall:
24. He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
25. My apple trees will never get across
26. And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
27. He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors'.
28. Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
29. If I could put a notion in his head:
30. 'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
31. Where there are cows?
32. But here there are no cows.
33. Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
34. What I was walling in or walling out,
35. And to whom I was like to give offence.
36. Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
37. That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him,
38. But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
39. He said it for himself. I see him there
40. Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
41. In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
42. He moves in darkness as it seems to me~
43. Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
44. He will not go behind his father's saying,
45. And he likes having thought of it so well
46. He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."
补墙
1. 有一點什麼，它大概是不喜歡牆，
2. 它使得牆腳下的凍地漲得隆起，
3. 大白天的把牆頭石塊弄得紛紛落：
4. 使得牆裂了縫，二人並肩都走得過。
5. 士紳們行獵時又是另一番糟蹋：
6. 他們要掀開每塊石頭上的石頭，
7. 我總是跟在他們後面去修補，
8. 但是他們要把兔子從隱處趕出來，
9. 討好那群汪汪叫的狗。我說的牆縫
10. 是怎麼生的，誰也沒看見，誰也沒聽見
11. 但是到了春季補牆時，就看見在那裏。
12. 我通知了住在山那邊的鄰居；
13. 有一天我們約會好，巡視地界一番，
14. 在我們兩家之間再把牆重新砌起。
15. 我們走的時候，中間隔著一垛牆。
16. 我們走的時候，中間隔著一垛培。
17. 落在各邊的石頭，由各自去料理。
18. 有些是長塊的，有些幾乎圓得像球．
19. 需要一點魔術才能把它們放穩當：
20. “老實呆在那裏，等我們轉過身再落下！”
21. 我們搬弄石頭．把手指都磨粗了。
22. 啊！這不過又是一種戶外遊戲，
23. 一個人站在一邊。此外沒有多少用處：
24. 在牆那地方，我們根本不需要牆：
25. 他那邊全是松樹，我這邊是蘋果園。
26. 我的蘋果樹永遠也不會踱過去
27. 吃掉他松樹下的松球，我對他說。
28. 他只是說：“好籬笆造出好鄰家。”
29. 春天在我心裏作祟，我在懸想
30. 能不能把一個念頭注入他的腦裏：
31. “為什麼好籬笆造出好鄰家？是否指著
32. 有牛的人家？可是我們此地又沒有牛。
33. 我在造牆之前．先要弄個清楚，
34. 圈進來的是什麼，圈出去的是什麼，
35. 並且我可能開罪的是些什麼人家，
36. 有一點什麼，它不喜歡牆，
37. 它要推倒它。”我可以對他說這是“鬼”。
38. 但嚴格說也不是鬼．我想這事還是
39. 由他自己決定吧。我看見他在那裏
40. 搬一塊石頭，兩手緊抓著石頭的上端，
41. 像一個舊石器時代的武裝的野蠻人。
42. 我覺得他是在黑暗中摸索，
43. 這黑暗不僅是來自深林與樹蔭。
44. 他不肯探究他父親傳給他的格言
45. 他想到這句格言，便如此的喜歡，
46. 於是再說一遍，“好籬笆造出好鄰家”。
(梁實秋 譯)
本詩以簡明的語言敘述對於牆的兩種不同的態度。詩中的Speaker直接或間接說出他不願有牆的見解。而主張樹牆的對方的愚昧則以輕鬆的揶揄 (II.17-77) 或正面的批評(11.30-36, 38-42)揭露之。
不喜歡牆的"Something" (II.1, 35)及"it" (I.38)多半指一種代表自然的力量(II.2-3, 9-11)，而有反對牆的"notion" (I.29)的"T"於充滿希望的春天來補牆，實出於鄰人的固埶而無奈為之。詩中irony可由兩個鄰居會同建立使兩人分離的牆處看出。
全詩45行，無韻詩體(blank verse)。約可分為四段：
(1)第1-11行敘述石牆損壞的事實及原因。
(2)第12-20行描寫補牆的經過。
(3)第22-27行，Speaker 認為牆沒有用，他的鄰居卻主張「好籬笆造出好鄰家。」
(4)第28-45行說明Speaker試圖說明對方未果，並批評對方的愚昧。
「好籬笆造出好鄰居」這一句話並非全無道理。在某些情況下，我們甚至可以認為這是一句金玉良言。有些讀者或許會認為Frost讓Speaker的鄰居在詩 的中央(I.27)及最後(I.45)重覆這句話，便是意味著Frost贊成鄰居對牆的態度。但這是誤解 Speaker的真正的觀點。我們應該特別注意Speaker並非絕對的反對牆，而只是反對無用的，不必要的牆。
第30-34行意味著 Speaker也承 認當有牲畜擾害鄰居等情事時，牆仍可能是構成鄰居和睦相處的條件。這種開明的態度使Speaker有資格批評泥古不化的鄰居的頑迷。第41-42行中的 "darkness"實指未經啟蒙的野人的黑暗；是精神的黑暗，而不只是樹林的黑暗。
本詩的措辭極為平易，意象語亦多採自然的景物，兩者與詩的題材和人物的配合都非常穩當。在"T"與"my neighbor"的意見的對峙中，詩人使"hunters," "dogs," "rabbits,"及"Sun"等配合"Something"（意指自然，已見前述），而以"an old-stone savage armed"及"moves in darkness"等字眼描寫neighbor這是成功的對比手法的運用。 詩中的wall除了字面上的牆以外，當然更象徵著各種人為的籓籬。有用的牆可以達到保護或隔離的目的，而無用的牆卻無疑的是有形的交通和人與人的情誼的阻 礙。 Speaker反對樹牆，而對於不得不補牆一事卻能淡然處之（II.9-12）。可見有形的牆還沒有無形的牆可怕。有形的牆還有"Something"來 推倒它；無形的，精神上的牆便只有待"Mending Wall"這種詩來催毀了。
http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/frost/section3.rhtml
Summary
A stone wall separates the speaker's property from his neighbor's. In spring, the two meet to walk the wall and jointly make repairs. The speaker sees no reason for the wall to be kept--there are no cows to be contained, just apple and pine trees. He does not believe in walls for the sake of walls. The neighbor resorts to an old adage: "Good fences make good neighbors." The speaker remains unconvinced and mischievously presses the neighbor to look beyond the old-fashioned folly of such reasoning. His neighbor will not be swayed. The speaker envisions his neighbor as a holdover from a justifiably outmoded era, a living example of a dark-age mentality. But the neighbor simply repeats the adage.
Form
Blank verse is the baseline meter of this poem, but few of the lines march along in blank verse's characteristic lock-step iambs, five abreast. Frost maintains five stressed syllables per line, but he varies the feet extensively to sustain the natural speech-like quality of the verse. There are no stanza breaks, obvious end-rhymes, or rhyming patterns, but many of the end-words share an assonance (e.g., wall, hill, balls, wall, and well sun, thing, stone, mean, line, and again or game, them, and him twice). Internal rhymes, too, are subtle, slanted, and conceivably coincidental. The vocabulary is all of a piece--no fancy words, all short (only one word, another, is of three syllables), all conversational--and this is perhaps why the words resonate so consummately with each other in sound and feel.
Commentary
I have a friend who, as a young girl, had to memorize this poem as punishment for some now-forgotten misbehavior. Forced memorization is never pleasant; still, this is a fine poem for recital. "Mending Wall" is sonorous, homey, wry--arch, even--yet serene; it is steeped in levels of meaning implied by its well-wrought metaphoric suggestions. These implications inspire numerous interpretations and make definitive readings suspect. Here are but a few things to think about as you reread the poem.
The image at the heart of "Mending Wall" is arresting: two men meeting on terms of civility and neighborliness to build a barrier between them. They do so out of tradition, out of habit. Yet the very earth conspires against them and makes their task Sisyphean. Sisyphus, you may recall, is the figure in Greek mythology condemned perpetually to push a boulder up a hill, only to have the boulder roll down again. These men push boulders back on top of the wall; yet just as inevitably, whether at the hand of hunters or sprites, or the frost and thaw of nature's invisible hand, the boulders tumble down again. Still, the neighbors persist. The poem, thus, seems to meditate conventionally on three grand themes: barrier-building (segregation, in the broadest sense of the word), the doomed nature of this enterprise, and our persistence in this activity regardless.
But, as we so often see when we look closely at Frost's best poems, what begins in folksy straightforwardness ends in complex ambiguity. The speaker would have us believe that there are two types of people: those who stubbornly insist on building superfluous walls (with cliches as their justification) and those who would dispense with this practice--wall-builders and wall-breakers. But are these impulses so easily separable? And what does the poem really say about the necessity of boundaries?
The speaker may scorn his neighbor's obstinate wall-building, may observe the activity with humorous detachment, but he himself goes to the wall at all times of the year to mend the damage done by hunters; it is the speaker who contacts the neighbor at wall-mending time to set the annual appointment. Which person, then, is the real wall-builder? The speaker says he sees no need for a wall here, but this implies that there may be a need for a wall elsewhere-- "where there are cows," for example. Yet the speaker must derive something, some use, some satisfaction, out of the exercise of wall-building, or why would he initiate it here? There is something in him that does love a wall, or at least the act of making a wall.
This wall-building act seems ancient, for it is described in ritual terms. It involves "spells" to counteract the "elves," and the neighbor appears a Stone-Age savage while he hoists and transports a boulder. Well, wall-building is ancient and enduring--the building of the first walls, both literal and figurative, marked the very foundation of society. Unless you are an absolute anarchist and do not mind livestock munching your lettuce, you probably recognize the need for literal boundaries. Figuratively, rules and laws are walls; justice is the process of wall-mending. The ritual of wall maintenance highlights the dual and complementary nature of human society: The rights of the individual (property boundaries, proper boundaries) are affirmed through the affirmation of other individuals' rights. And it demonstrates another benefit of community; for this communal act, this civic "game," offers a good excuse for the speaker to interact with his neighbor. Wall-building is social, both in the sense of "societal" and "sociable." What seems an act of anti-social self-confinement can, thus, ironically, be interpreted as a great social gesture. Perhaps the speaker does believe that good fences make good neighbors-- for again, it is he who initiates the wall-mending.
Of course, a little bit of mutual trust, communication, and goodwill would seem to achieve the same purpose between well-disposed neighbors--at least where there are no cows. And the poem says it twice: "something there is that does not love a wall." There is some intent and value in wall-breaking, and there is some powerful tendency toward this destruction. Can it be simply that wall-breaking creates the conditions that facilitate wall-building? Are the groundswells a call to community- building--nature's nudge toward concerted action? Or are they benevolent forces urging the demolition of traditional, small-minded boundaries? The poem does not resolve this question, and the narrator, who speaks for the groundswells but acts as a fence-builder, remains a contradiction.
Many of Frost's poems can be reasonably interpreted as commenting on the creative process; "Mending Wall" is no exception. On the basic level, we can find here a discussion of the construction-disruption duality of creativity. Creation is a positive act--a mending or a building. Even the most destructive-seeming creativity results in a change, the building of some new state of being: If you tear down an edifice, you create a new view for the folks living in the house across the way. Yet creation is also disruptive: If nothing else, it disrupts the status quo. Stated another way, disruption is creative: It is the impetus that leads directly, mysteriously (as with the groundswells), to creation. Does the stone wall embody this duality? In any case, there is something about "walking the line"--and building it, mending it, balancing each stone with equal parts skill and spell--that evokes the mysterious and laborious act of making poetry.
On a level more specific to the author, the question of boundaries and their worth is directly applicable to Frost's poetry. Barriers confine, but for some people they also encourage freedom and productivity by offering challenging frameworks within which to work. On principle, Frost did not write free verse. His creative process involved engaging poetic form (the rules, tradition, and boundaries--the walls--of the poetic world) and making it distinctly his own. By maintaining the tradition of formal poetry in unique ways, he was simultaneously a mender and breaker of walls.
A Minor Bird 小鳥
我只希望小鸟飞得远远， I have wished a bird would fly away，
不要竟日吱喳在我门前。 And not sing by my house all day；
我曾经在门口对它击掌， Have clapped my hands at him from the door，
似乎已不耐于鸟的歌唱。 When it seemed as if I could bear no more.
想来必是部份责任在我， The fault must partly have been in me，
鸟儿的鸣啭本无过错。 The bird was not to blame for his key.
当然我难免有点儿冒失， And of course there must be something wrong，
试想将任何的歌曲休止。 In wanting to silence any song.
Dayday:
The poet really presents an inverted view, unconventional but ture.
Everything one see in his blue day appears not pleasing to his eyes…even that vulnerable bird…
Dust of Snow 雪尘
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
一只乌鸦 The way a crow
抖落雪尘 Shook down on me
自铁杉枝桠撒我一身 From a hemlock tree
使我的心 Has given my heart
有了变化 A change of mood
一天的郁闷 And saved some part
次迭升华。 Of a day I had rued.
宋颖豪 译者注：这首诗的原文仅只一句，能以排列为二节六行，且形式整齐，语气盎然 ，不愧是大家之作。而译文虽略有变动，皆在传译其精髓。
Dayday:
宋颖豪厉害，连“郁闷”(rue)这样的词都给宋大爷给整出来了……佩服……
补充说明：
宋颖豪（本名宋广仁）一九三○年生，河南襄城人。文学硕士；曾服军旅达三十五年，并在各大学讲授美国文学、诗选、翻译等课程。早於四○年代後期即以念汝、 白圭、襄人、殷嗣等笔名发表诗作。嗣於五○年代中期乃转注於英美诗的译介，卓有优绩。著有《麦帅传》、海明威研究及中国现代史论文多篇。译有《诗经验 谈》、《美国诗选》、《水晶诗选》、艾略特的《诗选》及＜荒原＞等。现任《诗象》诗社社长及文协翻译委员会主任委员。
On Looking Up by Chance at the Constellations
1. You'll wait a long, long time for anything much
2. To happen in heaven beyond the floats of cloud
3. And the Northern Lights that run like tingling nerves.
4. The sun and moon get crossed, but they never touch,
5. Nor strike out fire from each other nor crash out loud.
6. The planets seem to interfere in their curves
7. But nothing ever happens, no harm is done.
8. We may as well go patiently on with our life,
9. And look elsewhere than to stars and moon and sun
10. For the shocks and changes we need to keep us sane.
11. It is true the longest drouth will end in rain,
12. The longest peace in China will end in strife.
13. Still it wouldn't reward the watcher to stay awake
14. In hopes of seeing the calm of heaven break
15. On his particular time and personal sight.
16. That calm seems certainly safe to last to-night.
Dayday:
“On Looking Up by Chance at the Constellations”
i was caught by this title at the first sight which reminded me of that star-strewn dome, blue, dark and infinite.
How long ago was my last time looking up?...…
Being staying on the run for too long? And turned blind to the Nature from which we can derive the greatest pleasure?
Unjustifiable…
The Secret Sits
1. We dance round in a ring and suppose,
2. But the Secret sits in the middle and knows.
密坐
1. 我們圍成一圈跳舞並推測,
2. 但秘密坐在中央且瞭然.
1. 我們永遠只能繞著未知,而樂於揣摩
2. 但是神秘存在於未知的核心,只有自己能領略本質
1. 我們圍成一個圓圈跳舞,猜測,
2. 而秘密坐在其中知曉一切.
Lodged
1. The rain to the wind said,
2. "You push and I'll pelt."
3. They so smote the garden bed
4. That the flowers actually knelt,
5. And lay lodged--though not dead.
6. I know how the flowers felt.
A Patch of Old Snow 一片殘雪
1. There's a patch of old snow in a corner
2. That I should have guessed
3. Was a blow-away paper the rain
4. Had brought to rest.
5. It is speckled with grime as if
6. Small print overspread it,
7. The news of a day I've forgotten—
8. If I ever read it.
另一个译本:
Nothing Gold Can Stay(黃金事物難久留)
- by Robert Frost
(1874 - 1963)
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
自然的初綠是為金,
她這種色彩最難存.
她的新葉像朵花;
但也只能保剎那.
之後葉復褪為葉.
同理伊甸淪悲切,
同理清晨沉為晝.
黃金事物難久留.
(彭鏡禧 夏燕生 譯)
Design--by Rober Frost
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white
On a white heal-all, holding up a moth
Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth--
Assorted characters of death and blight
Mixed ready to begin the morning right
Like the ingredients of a witches' broth--
A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth
And dead wings carried like a paper kite.
What had that flower to do with being white
The wayside blue and innocent heal-all
What brought the kindred spider to that height
Then steered the white moth thither in the night
What but design of darkness to appall
If design govern in a thing so small
heal-all-- a plant, normally with blue blossoms, reputed
to have healing powers.
雪夜林畔小驻
傅洛帛
应识谁家林，
小屋卧小村。
安知余伫此，
雪夜观雪林。
驻斯马诧然，
四顾无人烟。
林湖两相静，
此岁今夕暗。
铃音飘然起，
轻询胡不归。
和风悄然过，
絮雪带声飞。
可怜幽邃林，
但惜守誓信。
路迢安能寝，
路迢安能寝。
弗罗斯特诗歌比喻的喻体
摘要：弗罗斯特诗歌中比喻的喻体丰富多彩，有以自然中的现象、景观、物产、动物，也有以日常生活中的农具、餐具、女性美、人体、宗教和神话传说为喻体的。这些喻体折射出诗人对自然、对生活的热爱和个人的痛苦经历以及宗教对西方人生活的影响等。
关键词：喻体；自然；生活；宗教
Metaphorical Objects in Frost’s Poetry
Abstract: In Frost’s poetry, there are various metaphorical objects, such as natural scenery, phenomenon, animals and flowers in nature, others are closely associated with life, farm tools, food, women’s beauty, human body, religion and mythology, etc.. All these reflect the poet’s love for nature and life, his sad experience in life and the influence religion exerted upon western people’s daily life.
Key words: metaphorical objects; nature; life; religion
罗伯特•弗罗斯特（Robert Frost, 1874-1963）是20世纪美国最杰出的诗人之一。他的诗歌语言质朴、清新、近乎口语化，但折射出真理的光辉。这与他诗歌中大量使用的比喻是分不开的。他说过：“诗始于普通的隐喻，巧妙的隐喻和‘高雅’的隐喻，适于我们所拥有的最深刻的思想。”[1]他还说过：“我发现自己对诗歌还有不少谈论，但其中最重要的是谈隐喻，即指东说西，以此述彼，隐秘的欢欣。诗简直就是由隐喻构成。”[2]从某种意义上讲，比喻构筑起弗罗斯特诗歌结构的有机张力，使其诗歌语言清新活泼，生动形象，富于哲理，丰富了诗歌的表达力，增强了诗歌语言的感染力，增添了他文笔的光彩。
众所周知，弗罗斯特常被誉为自然诗人。他创作了许多流传的自然诗篇如《雪夜在林边停留》（Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening）、《金色光华难常驻》（Nothing Gold Can Stay）、《荒野》（Desert Places）、《既不远，也不深》(Neither out Far nor in Deep)等。他歌唱大自然中的山川湖泊、日月星辰、海浪沙滩、花木鸟虫。他喜欢独自漫步在静静的夜空下、树林中、草地上，凝视美丽幽静的星空，倾听林中鸟儿的争鸣，采撷朵朵花草。他曾在《进入自我》一诗中明确宣称对自然的眷恋和热爱：“我的心愿”之一是那黑沉沉的树木，那古朴苍劲、柔风难吹进的树林。 [3]大自然的一草一木能使诗人忘掉不快的现实、寒冷的冬季、内心的忧伤和痛苦。一只乌鸦也能给诗人带来欢欣、希望，使诗人精神振奋。他在《雪尘》一诗中写道：“一只乌鸦/从一颗铁杉树上把雪尘抖落到/我身上的方式//已使我抑郁的心情/为之一振/并从我懊悔的一天中/挽回了一部分。”由于诗人酷爱自然，大自然美丽的景观、现象、丰富的物产，初升的太阳，落日的余晖，风霜雪雨，珍珠宝石，尘土卵石不仅成为他咏歌的主题，也成了他诗歌比喻的喻体。在诗人看来，一块小小的划地也弥足珍贵，价值连城，也像太阳那样使大自然中的万事万物充满生机和活力，孕育一切生命。诗人写道：“一片浸透水的草地，/小如宝石，形如太阳，/一片圆形的草地，不比周围的树林宽敞”（《红朱兰》）。大自然的尘土也变成金灿灿的的黄金：“所有被大风高高扬起的灰尘/在落日余辉中显得都像黄金”（《漫天黄金》）。春回大地之时，“大自然的新绿珍贵如金”（《金色光华难常驻》）。黎明前的雨点像珠宝：“有人形容指晓前的雨点像珍珠，/天亮后在阳光照耀下则变成钻石”（《谷间鸟鸣》）。呼吸也像大自然中的微风：“太阳烤热的山坡使我的脸发烧，/我的呼吸像微风使野花摇头，/我可以闻闻泥土和草木的气息，/可以从蚁穴洞口看里面的蚂蚁。”（《地利》）
弗罗斯特一生历尽艰辛和痛苦，他幼年丧父，中年丧妻，老年丧子（女）。成名后的弗罗斯特受聘于多所大学，经党外出读诗和演讲，“经常拖着病体疲惫不堪地回家。”[4]他诗歌中常常出现与孤独、绝望、死亡等关联的意象如冬、雪、冰、霜、枯叶等。生活的艰辛，人世的沧桑使诗人对生活已感到厌倦，就像在树林中迷路的旅行者一样，蛛丝缠面，满脸烧伤，一只眼睛还因擦伤而在流泪。诗人精神上肉体上的痛苦已不堪忍受，他要借爬白桦树寻找一条出路，一条通向天国的道路，离开人世间一段时间：“我喜欢凭着爬一颗白桦树离去，/攀着黑色树枝沿雪白的树干上天”（《白桦树》）。
因此，弗罗斯特常常以凋零的玫瑰、干枯的花朵等以喻体以映衬孤独、悲哀、寂寞的内心世界。《风暴之歌》中的蜜蜂也不再采撷花草，林中的鸟儿也停止了歌唱。诗人写道：“森林的歌声全都被撕碎，就像/易遭摧残的野玫瑰凋零。”那被大火烧毁的房子已化为灰烬，只剩下根烟囱孑然独立， “活像四周掉光了花瓣的花蕊。”（《熟悉乡下事之必要》）诗人已厌倦了生活：“那是在我厌倦了思考的时候，/这时生活太像一座没有路的树林，/你的脸因撞上蜘蛛网而发痒发烧，/你的一只眼睛在流泪，因为一根/小树枝在它睁着时抽了它一下。”（《白桦林》）《春潭》以大自然顽强的生命力，衬托出人类的卑微和渺小：“春潭虽掩蔽在浓密的树林，/却依然能映出无暇的蓝天，/像潭边野花一样瑟瑟颤栗，/也会像野花一样很快枯干。”《意志》呈现给读者一幅可怕的画面：白色蜘蛛在白色万灵草上抓住一只飞蛾，“蜘蛛像雪花莲，小花儿像浮沫，/飞蛾垂死的翅膀则像一纸风筝。”而潘的“皮肤、毛发和眼睛都是灰色，/是墙头上苔藓的那种灰色——”（《潘与我们在一起》）。
由于诗人亲近自然，自然界中的动物也成了他诗歌中比喻的喻体。自然界中的落叶“像有野兔在逃窜， /像有野鹿在逃循。”（《收落叶》）一个暴风雨之夜，诗人冒着雪赶回家，“雪化成冰水顺着他的脖子直往下流，/像床上一只淘气的猫吮吸他的气息。”（《固执的回归》）面朗伸开的双臂“像翅膀张开”（《布朗下山》）。《被骚扰的花》一诗中的他：“每吐出一个字/他的嘴唇都吮吸一下，/这种努力使他透不过气来，/就像是老虎含着根骨头。”
二
弗罗斯特的人生哲学具有悖论性。一方面，生活的艰辛与磨难，使他产生了厌倦情绪。另一方面，他人为，生活中有许多美好的东西值得追求，因此，生活又值得眷恋。没有对大自然的热爱，便没有对人类、对生活的热爱。对自然的热爱，进而使他热爱生活。正是对自然对生活和对人类的热爱促使他拿起诗笔创作了许多优美的自然诗篇。他在《生存考验》一诗中写道：“上帝把人世生存的短暂的梦/描绘得非常完满，充满温情。”诗人指出，人生虽然苦短，但生活中充满温情，值得人去追求，这充分表明诗人对生活的热爱和对美好生活的向往和憧憬。他对生活的热爱使他憎恨毁灭人类的力量 ——冰与火，仇恨和欲望的象征。《冰与火》表露出诗人对未来世界的担忧，充分表达了诗人对生活，对人类的眷恋之情。由于弗罗斯特熟谙生活，热爱生活，他诗歌中以生活为喻体的比喻也构成了他诗歌比喻的重要部分，这些包括以现实生活中的用具、农具、餐具为喻体的比喻。《士兵》中“他就像那柄掷出后坠地的投枪， /如今静静躺在地里沾露生锈，/但枪尖仍锋利像在耕地的犁头。”那些在雾中噪鸣的雨蛙“就像朦胧雪地里隐约的雪橇铃声”（《雨蛙溪》）。诗人“用铁锹去铲落叶，/科就像用铁勺，/成包成袋的落叶/却像气球般轻飘。”（《收落叶》）
弗罗斯特还以食物作为喻体。波士顿以北布满石块的农场里，石块形状各异，“石块有的像雨包，/有的呈球状”（《补墙》）。破门而入的泥石流“就像没有发酵的面团”（《关于消顶扩基》）。一块小小的卵石也能使诗人动心，精神振奋，虽然对于别人它一文不值：“我经营着一片遍地卵石的牧场，/卵石像满满一篮鸡蛋使人动心”（《咏家乡的卵石》）。他还以文艺作为喻体。《布朗下山》这样写布朗滑行下山的动作：“他就像表演旋转舞似的滑行，/这种姿态颇有尊严和风度。”《新罕布什尔》中那个做买卖刚回来的家伙“站在他那个开着门的牧口棚里，/像个孤独的演员在昏暗的舞台上”。诗人猜想一堆残雪是被风刮走的一张报纸：“雪堆上有点点污迹，像是/报上小小的铅字，/像我已忘记的某天的新闻 —/如果我读过它的话。”（《一堆残雪》）诗人也要用人体做为比喻的喻体。《新罕布什尔》中的那个伐木队长为了躲避原木：“他拼命要躲开一根像一条手臂/ 伸向天空要砸断他脊梁的原木”。那条城中的小溪则“像手臂环抱着农舍”（《城中小溪》）。
诗人揉自然与生活为一体的比喻还体现在他以女性，尤其女性之美为喻体。沼泽地里有各种各样的野花“每一种都像一张少女的脸”（《在一条山谷里》）。那树干压弯、树叶垂地的白桦树被比作匍匐在草地上的少女，长发倒垂，正在阳光下吹晒秀发。诗人写道：“在以后的岁月里，你会在树林中/看见它们树干弯曲，树叶垂地，/就像姑娘们手脚并用叭在地上/任洗过的头发散在头上让太阳晒干。”（《白桦树》）
在英美社会发展中，宗教和神话都曾产生过相当大的影响。基督教和古希腊古罗马的神话传说是英语文化不可分割的一部分，对英语文化的形成和发展起了关键性的作用。基督教是英美社会的主要精神支柱，因此，它影响到日常生活的各个方面。弗罗斯特诗中以宗教和神话传说为喻体的比喻颇多。诗中人的树林，那些小小的冷杉树“活像一座座耸着尖塔的教堂”（《圣诞树——一封寄给亲友的圣诞贺涵》）。《雪》一诗中的“他”十分重要，因为“他一走这里静得像空荡荡的教堂”。那些白人的祖先“就像那些为亚当的子孙娶妻的祖先”（《新罕布什尔》）。诗人在夏目里每每经过那鸟儿栖息的地方，必定驻足，抬头仰望，因为“一只小鸟放开美妙歌喉”，/如天使一般在树上啁啾。（《觅鸟，在冬日黄昏》）诗人的自言自语“像是在祈祷”（《试车》）。一只白色蜘蛛在白色万灵草上抓住一只飞蛾“与死亡和枯萎相称相配的特征/混合在一起正好准备迎接清晨，/就像一个女巫汤锅里加的配料”（《意志》）。《取水》中的两位来树林提水的人，一进树林便停止，“像躲开月神而匿的地神”。《夜空彩虹》中的诗中人在一个有雾的晚上，走下山冈，穿过刚刚被雨淋过的田野和树篱回家的途中，发现一道使人困惑的光，“就像古罗马人认为他们在孟菲斯/从高地上见过的那种奇异的光芒——”。紫边兰那“白得像幽灵的花蕾”（《寻找紫边兰》）使人想到孤独和死亡。《等待》中的诗中人把自己比做幽灵：“有些什么会入梦，当我像一个幽灵/飘过那些匆匆垛成的高高的草堆”。《星星》一诗中，星星代表了自然的眼睛。大自然显得十分冷漠，无视人类的存在：“然而既无爱心也无仇恨，/星星就像弥涅瓦雕像/那些雪白的大理石眼睛，/有眼无珠，张目亦盲。”
除此之外，弗罗斯特诗中，还有其它种类的喻体。《补墙》中那位力主补墙者“一只手抓紧一块石头，就像/旧石器时代的野蛮人手持武器一样。 / 我觉得他仿佛进入了一片黑暗，/那黑暗不仅仅因树阴遮蔽了目光。”《仆人们的仆人》中那位女仆难以表达自己的情感，“我不能表露自己的感情，就像/我不能提高嗓门或不想抬手一样”。在理发店里与理发师聊天的渔夫的“船停泊在洒满阳光的草坪上，/满船的花草都已经长到舷缘，/就像它当年从乔治洲返航，/满载着鳕鱼乘风破浪把家还。”（《花船》）当夜幕降临，诗中人窗前的树“梦一般迷蒙的树梢拔地而起，/高高树冠弥漫在半天云里”（《我窗前的树》）。
