"Oven Bird" by Robert Frost
There is a singer everyone has heard,
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,
Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.
He says that leaves are old and that for flowers
Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.
He says the early petal-fall is past
When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers
On sunny days a moment overcast;
And comes that other fall we name the fall.
He says the highway dust is over all.
The bird would cease and be as other birds
But that he knows in singing not to sing.
The question that he frames in all but words
Is what to make of a diminished thing.
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,
Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.
He says that leaves are old and that for flowers
Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.
He says the early petal-fall is past
When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers
On sunny days a moment overcast;
And comes that other fall we name the fall.
He says the highway dust is over all.
The bird would cease and be as other birds
But that he knows in singing not to sing.
The question that he frames in all but words
Is what to make of a diminished thing.
First reactions
The oven bird Frost is referring to is one that continually spells the end of things, but one that poses the question of "what to make of a diminished thing." Initially, this poem seems cynical, but that final question offers some hope in that, while diminished, these things can still be enjoyed.
Paraphrase
Everyone has heard this bird; it's a loud bird that is found in temperate climates in forested areas. Its song means the leaves are old and that mid-summer is the end of spring, The blooming flowers have their petals fall in showers with the start of summer. When fall comes, the highway dust covers everything. The bird is like any other bird, except by their song. The question the bird's presents is "what to make of a diminished thing."
Paraphrase
Everyone has heard this bird; it's a loud bird that is found in temperate climates in forested areas. Its song means the leaves are old and that mid-summer is the end of spring, The blooming flowers have their petals fall in showers with the start of summer. When fall comes, the highway dust covers everything. The bird is like any other bird, except by their song. The question the bird's presents is "what to make of a diminished thing."
SWIFTT
SW – First off, this poem is a sonnet, with an a-a-b-c-b-d-e-d-e-e-f-g-f-g rhyme scheme. In the poem, Frost makes use of irregular sentences to keep the pace of the poem quick.
I – One gets the image of an ovenbird perched on a branch just singing as the world around them changes, with secondary images such as the fall of the cherry blossom petals and the covering of highway dust.
F – One use of figurative language is the idiom "one to ten." Another is the continued use of "saying" to describe the ovenbird's song.
T – The tone of the poem is whimsical. Frost is ascribing various qualities to an ovenbird and its singing, which of course is impossible to do.
T – The theme of the poem is that things end; the ovenbird's song means an end to the spring. However, the question posed means that there are still things to be done and the potential to enjoy things further.
Conclusions
My conclusion is more or less the same as my initial reading, though with the added element of understanding the sonnet form and the figurative language.
