Challenge task – Follow on from this sentence – The story
can be broken up into three distinct stages, a start, middle and end.  

The speaker is walking past a swamp in cold weather when he comes across a small bird. The small bird is very frightened of the voice. The voice is distracted by a pile of wood, so seemingly out of place; thus the bird is free to travel on.

The opening is a description of the surroundings. The middle is the meeting with the bird. The end has a return to the surroundings.

Describe the scene he sets then write about it in more
detail. Here’s a few ideas:

Here are some things to thing about:

What kind of climates do we expect to find swamps in and are
these climates usually frozen?

Spot the binary opposition in the first line?

What might be the effects of these discrepancies and
oppositions presented in the first few lines?

What information does the speaker give us about his location
and where he’s going?

In what ways does Frost convey the speaker’s character
through the way he talks – are there any distinctive phrases or word choices?

In the first 3 lines the speaker uses the first person
singular pronoun ‘I’ then at the end of line 3 he uses the first person plural in the statement, ‘we shall see’. Who’s the ‘we’ and why does Frost suddenly change the mode of address? Furthermore what does the statement ‘we shall see’ suggest about the nature of the speaker’s journey?

Challenge task - In his essay ‘the figure a poem makes Frost
said that a good poem should ‘start in delight and end in wisdom’. Can you find any delight in this poem and if not what might the significance of its absence be? Remember the significance must be in terms of the story being told not Frost’s own life.

Swamps can be present iin hot or cold places but are usually paramount in areas of hot climates. Swamps are not normally frozen so this adds an unsettling feel to the poem. From this first line we have a sense of tension and unease. The speaker is clearly unsettled by this initially because the speaker wishes to turn around but then changes his mind (it wouldn't have been much of a story otherwise)!

This gives the reader a similar sense of unease.

The speaker is unclear where he is going - he has no destination and is wandering aimlessly! This suggests that speaker is quite a spontaneous person and doesnt like to be bound by time constraints and usual expectations. This is emphasised by lines such as, "and we shall see". The speaker initially seems unperturbed about his lack of knowledge of the surrounding area.

The reader knows that the speaker is unsure of his location, both the reader and speaker are aware that the speaker is far from home.

The speaker is a lone figure although there is shift from first to third person. This is a technique employed by Frost to make the reader feel part of the the journey undertaken by the speaker. It also emphasises that both reader and speaker are unclear of the destination of the journey.

Why does Frost include the interaction described in this
section of the poem? What does it add to the story?

Challenge task – can you connect the emotions of the bird
with the speaker’s own state of mind?

Follow on from this sentence opening - The woodpile is
presented as… (Describe some of the distinguishing features of the woodpile and what the connotations of these features might be)

Follow on from this sentence - The woodpile itself implies
other further stories beyond this one such as …

Challenge task - Complete this sentence - A connection is
also made in the last line with the opening line of the poem through the rhyme of grey day and decay, suggesting…

Challenge task - In his essay ‘The figure a poem makes’
Frost says that a good poem ‘ends in a clarification of life-not necessarily a great clarification, such as sects and cults are founded on, but in a momentary stay against confusion. It has denouement. It has an outcome that though unforeseen was predestined from the first image of the original mood-and indeed from the very mood.’ What kind of clarification does Frost present us with at the end of this poem?