Stopping by woods on a snowy evening

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 farmhouse 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.

Robert Frost

This seems all the more apt in the midst of my moot week when I have loads of work to do. In any case, ‘Stopping by woods…’ has been one of my favorite poems ever since I can remember. Frost wrote poems which could be read on many different levels, and you could still enjoy the superficial surface meaning. Here, he plays a fair bit with the overdone sleep-death metaphor. Beyond the surface is the more melancholic feel marked by a longing for death and weariness from the pain of existence and the imagery of winter and night sets a fine backdrop to it.