A Quick and easy guide to understanding

poetry

1.Learn about the author/time period

2.Read through the poem

3.Ask: “How does this relate to me?”

•One of the most famous American poets

•He spent most of his life living in the country in New England, and even tried to be a farmer in his early married life.

• He was famous for using his rural surroundings as inspiration for his poetry.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,And sorry I could not travel bothAnd be one traveler, long I stoodAnd looked down one as far as I couldTo where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair,And having perhaps the better claimBecause it was grassy and wanted wear,Though as for that the passing thereHad worn them really about the same,And both that morning equally layIn leaves no step had trodden black.Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to wayI doubted if I should ever come back.I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.

•woods, nature

•a man walking

•two roads

*What can these images be a METAPHOR for?

*Have you ever had to choose between two important things?

*Think of at least two times in your life you have had to choose between two important things. *Discuss these times with your partner:* what happened afterwards? *Are you glad you made that choice? Why or Why not?