Birches

by Robert Frost, Ed Young (Illustrator)

Birches beautifully illustrates Frost's celebrated ability to blend observation, imagination, and poetry. Caldecott medalist Ed Young uses his own powers of observation and imagination to create an extraordinary series of paintings that complement and extend the poem.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Picture Books, Childrens, Fiction, American, Literature

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1916

About the author

Flinty, moody, plainspoken and deep, Robert Frost was one of America's most popular 20th-century poets. Frost 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 write while living in New Hampshire and then Vermont. His pastoral images of apple trees and stone fences -- along with his solitary, man-of-few-words poetic voice -- helped define the modern image of rural New England. Frost's poems include "Mending Wall" ("Good fences make good neighbors"), "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" ("Whose woods these are I think I know"), and perhaps his most famous work, "The Road Not Taken" ("Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-- / I took the one less traveled by"). Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry 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 (or simply Poet Laureate) in 1986.

Frost recited his poem "The Gift Outright" at the 1961 inauguration of John F. Kennedy... Frost attended both Dartmouth College and Harvard, but did not graduate from either school... 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."

Reviews

[Lisa Vegan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a lovely edition of Robert Frost's poem Birches. Ed Young's illustrations couldn’t be better. They’re gorgeous, creative, unusual, and create the perfect atmosphere for the poem. They’re special and amazing. Even though this is a picture book, I’m surprised it’s considered a children’s book. Yes, children can enjoy it, but this is a poem I think is more fully appreciated by adults, or teens, or maybe older children. The poem is told over the illustrated pages and then the entire poem is presented on two pages, with a single, unobtrusive illustration.

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful art - well done introduction to the poetry of Frost: read with a young child before taking a walk in the woods - wonderful.

[Adeline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Robert Frost's poem “Birches” utilizes the beauty of the natural world as a vehicle for a reflection on life. The poem's narrator, a grown and somewhat aged man, looks at a stand of birches and ponders his own life, both the beauty of it and the melancholy. The poem relies largely on memory, speculation, and self-reflection on the part of the narrator to present its ideas. The narrator's observations on life and nature accurately present the dynamic characteristics of both, as well as the complexities surrounding man's relationship to the natural world.
“Birches” tackles the range of life from boyhood to death. With this in mind, it is interesting to note that the poem begins with a time related word, “When”. This helps set the tone for the poem, as the reader knows it is about specific places in time, as well as a possible reflection on the past. Also, the reader is immediately made aware that the poem is about nature, and birches in particular. Not only is the title quite explicit, but the first line depicts the narrator looking at a stand of trees. The trees bend “to left and right/across the lines of straighter darker trees” (1). Here, a contrast has been established. There is not only a stand of birches, but the birches are set against other trees that are distinctly different in color as well as shape. The other trees seem austere compared to the playfully swaying birches. This contrast suggests that while the narrator is at the adult and seemingly austere stage of his life, he feels nostalgia for the playful days of youth. Further evidence appears in the next line: “I like to think some boy's been swinging them” (3). He pictures the actions of childhood even as he stands straight and dark towards the end of his life.
The narrator then begins a reminiscence regarding ice storms. Ice storms, while a natural force, cause changes to the trees that never go away. This references the complexities of life and the process of growing up; damaging events happen that forever leave a mark on man and those around him. This is a particularly effective comparison because just as the trees are visibly changed, they are also changed on the inside where we cannot see. Their cells have been deformed, and in this way the effect of the ice storm on the trees is even more human. Life changing events may add a wrinkle to the face or a stoop to the back, but they can also change people on the inside. In this way, the connection between humans and nature is emphasized: humans and nature react to outside forces in the same way. Humans are susceptible to uncontrollable events just as much as the trees; we are all part of nature, not above it. But, like the trees which “...seem not to break; though once they are bowed/ So low for long, they never right themselves” (15) humans learn to survive. It is the instinct of nature (and us, as a part of it) to survive despite adversity.
The narrator then breaks his train of thought and returns to his original purpose: to discuss the image of boys swinging on trees. He wants to picture this more idyllic reason for why the trees are bent, not all that “matter-of-fact about the ice-storm” (21). Picturing boys “swinging” the birches brings the narrator back to his own youth. The narrator seems to admire nature and be genuinely awed by its beauty, particularly when he describes fallen ice as looking like “the inner dome of Heaven” (13), yet when imagining the boy bending the trees he uses diction that suggests man is above or more powerful than nature. The boy “subdues” (28) the trees until there are no more left to “conquer” (32). It raises the age old question: what is the role of humans in nature and the role of nature in humans? Does one shape the other, or do they exert effects on both? The narrator of Birches seems to advocate a mutual involvement. Man may wonder at the beauty of nature and nature may provide meaning, but man can also be conquerer of nature.
The power of nature to provoke reminiscence is exemplified in the discussion of the boy swinging on trees. The single image of birch trees has the ability to recall a slew of memories about youth and, as the poem moves on, life itself. Again, a time reference re-frames the narrative: “It's when I'm weary of considerations” (44). Here the poem changes; the narrator is no longer reminiscing about the past, but considering the present and speculating about the future. It is at this point that the reader is reminded once again that the narrator is a man far from the days of swinging on birch trees. Instead, he has seen many things and grown weary. Sometimes the “considerations” and daily duties of life become too much to handle. Although the narrator has shifted his time frame, nature continues to be the vehicle through which he considers his life. Now that he has grown up life is sometimes “too much like a pathless wood” (45), and these are the times that the narrator reflects on. The effects of the considerations of life are compared to weeping eyes “from a twig's having lashed across” (48) them or the burning sensation of a cobweb “broken across” (47) one's face. These sensations may seem, at first, trivial, but when one considers the complete situation the feelings of the narrator are universally recognizable. The dark beauty of the woods becomes frightening when one realizes that the path is lost, and petty annoyances like cobwebs can become the instigators of panic.
The solution to this weariness, as the narrator muses, is “to get away from earth awhile/And then come back to it and begin over” (50). This is a rather fanciful position, and as of now, scientifically impossible. But the narrator doesn't wish to die or commit suicide. He realizes that what he wishes may not be possible, but as it is a fantasy and not an expectation he can wish all he want. “May no fate willfully misunderstand me”, he implores, “And half grant what I wish and snatch me away/ Not to return” (52). This is musing on the part of the narrator that once again establishes the inexorable connection between man and nature: “Earth's the right place for love:/ I don't know where it's likely to go better” (54). Despite the complexities and wearying cobwebs, the lashing twigs and the responsibilities, earth is where the narrator wants to be. Love, a fundamental element in human life, can be found at its best in nature and on our own planet.
The poem then comes full circle as the narrator returns to his youthful birch swinging fantasies. He incorporates boyhood playfulness into his wishes as an older man. To “climb black branches up a snow-white trunk/ Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more” (57) would be an ideal way to escape the tribulations of life. In fact, to climb towards heaven on birches “would be good both going and coming back” (59). Just like the young boy who rides birches as they swing him back to the ground, birches would dip the narrator back down to earth from heaven. The narrator's perspective on the natural world is complex: he recognizes its beauty and majesty yet also sees the joy in conquering it, and while he finds it beautiful and the “right place for love”, he also describes his weariness in natural terms. By addressing these various perspectives, the narrator provides a story that is much more realistic and accessible than, for example, a poem about the pure joy of life and the untouchable prestige of nature. “Birches” touches on the lighthearted joy of life as well as the frustrations that make us want to run away, even if we aren't exactly ready for suicide. The poem captures the sensation of life being too much like a “pathless wood” and makes it seem livable. The narrator reminds his readers that the pleasures of childhood, like swinging on trees, don't have to be given up forever. It never hurts to remember that “one could do worse than be a swinger of birches” (60).

[HR Habibur Rahman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Memory right? That's all we are left with when the time will be gone.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well after a burn on Mount Tam, when pert young Bay Laurel saplings had had a chance to cover and crowd the slopes, I would climb the summit sapling until it bowed, downhill, into the boughs of a downslope sister, which I'd hug onto: the first sapling, now free, snapping back erect, and I, now downslope, being lowered gently into the nether arms of yet another downhill goddess, and so on, all the way down the mountain.

We called it "Bay cruising."

Frost's "Birches" betrays an East Coast love of the swayings of similar sisters, "like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair before them over their heads to dry in the sun."

Lushly illustrated.

[Melody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Picked this up at a sale today- I can't resist this book. The illustrations mesh so beautifully with the words, and it's one of my favorite Frost poems. I like to have multiple copies of this one on hand to give away to any kid who happens within my grasp.

[Samantha · Rating 4 out of 5]

An illustrated version of Frost's poem. Each spread is so beautiful; they are frame-worthy. This is a title with appeal for young and old alike.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Birches" is one of my favorite Robert Frost poems, and Frost is one of my favorite poets. Illustrations by Ed Young complement the text.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of Robert Frost's most anthologized poems, Birches first appeared in Atlantic Monthly in the August issue of 1915, and was later collected in Frost's third book ‘Mountain Interval’, published in 1916. Consisting of 59 lines, Birches asserts Frost more as a poet of man than of nature. In actual fact, Frost himself agrees that his poetry is not all about nature with its pleasurable aspects, but more about the "drama of man in Nature".

‘Birches’ speaks about man's power over nature and the ecstasy of being in nature's lap which incites the thought of a temporal visit to heaven. The speaker, evocative of his boyish days, once more longs to be the swinger on the branches and peep at heaven from the top of the tree, only to return to earth after a while.

In this sense the poem is more about man's inimitable self, amidst nature, than about mere scenic portrayal of snow capped birches.

To begin with, the poem opens with a convoluted picture of birches, stretched in long line and sagging in the air. The speaker envisages as if a young boy is essentially swinging them. Yet the Birches remain unchanged until the weight of snow, formed during a cold winter night, enduringly bends their branches. The birches are thus, always seen stooped to touch the dried-up fern on the ground below.

The speaker compares them with a country girl on her hands and knees, bending her head down to dry her hair in the sun: The visual imagery is effervescent, like the animated image of a boy swinging the branches, as if in playful mood. Actually the boy's only entertainment is to get into his father's land and scrupulously climb the top of the tree which bends the branches down to the ground.

The poet intends to establish the conquest of man over nature, with such a picture that plainly takes him back to his boyish days.

The speaker remembers how often he used to swing the branches of the birches when he was a young boy. He acknowledges that it is not an easy job to be balanced at the top of the tree, just allowing the branches to bend as much needed to come safely to the ground. It's almost like pouring liquid over a cup brimmed to the full. A person needs to be careful enough remembering the chance to spill over the liquid on the floor.

However, the speaker's longing to go back to his childish days is just to flee the worldly dilemma which plagues him down. For an escape, he wishes to get lost in a pathless wood, walking amidst the dusty spider's web which will often bump on his face.

The speaker knows that his face will tickle when exposed to the spider's webs and the twigs will pinch upon his eyes. It will aid him to escape the realities of life and enjoy a provisional vacation in a life awash with responsibilities.

But then, if he demands for a break from life, destiny or any superior power should not take away his life without ensuring the safe return to earth. After all, the earth is a stunning place for life and the speaker knows no other place far better than this world, where life can be similarly beautiful.

Hence, he longs to release himself from the mundane duties only for a while. It's like enjoying the bliss of heaven without being dead.

The final lines of the poem simply assert the fact. The speaker says that he longs to reach heaven climbing the snow-capped branches of birches. But again he wants to return back to normal life once the branches bends low, failing to withstand his weight. This however the pleasure of life where one must seek for an impermanent escape and return back to reality.

The swinger of birches gets such chance of being both in the worlds of fact and fancy which makes life consequential.

[Christine Turner]

Need to order through ILL

[Dara Potvin]

Read this in my first year English literature class in 2008.

[Claudia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely love this. It very nearly makes you smell the ice frost roads of wintry New England! Read it now! :) xxx

[Sragdharamalini · Rating 5 out of 5]

Birches is a narrative poem written by the American poet Robert Frost and first appeared in the August issue of Atlantic Monthly in 1915 and was later published in 1916 in his third collection of poetry called Mountain Interval. Frost maintained that a poem “begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a loneliness. It is never a thought to begin with. It is at its best when it is a tantalizing vagueness.” And this is exactly what we find in “Birches”. Written blank verse following an iambic pentameter structure, it moves from a natural sketch to a fanciful explanation of the bending of the birches. Its demotic vocabulary does not isolate it from the pillars of poetic tradition.
Originally, this poem was called “Swinging Birches”, which provides a more accurate depiction of the subject.

In writing this poem, Frost was inspired both by another poem called “Swinging on a Birch-tree” by an American poet Lucy Lacrom and his childhood experience of swinging on birches, which was a popular game for children in rural areas of New England during the time. The poet reminisces those carefree days. The poem begins with an implicit tone of delight—the joy that reels one’s mind when one chances upon something of the past that evokes deep nostalgia, fills one’s mind with pleasant memories and makes one long to relive the bygone times. So it was when the poet sees the birches. Birches have slender trunks and thus bend easily in the wind and under the weight of snow and thus the poet sees them “bend to left and right”. The plosive alliteration of “birches bend” suggest the movement of these elegant trees as they sway and groan in the wind. The pliable, malleable quality of the birch tree captures the poet's attention and sets him in a meditative mood. Since some of them have a white bark, they are said to stand out against “the lines of straighter darker trees”, bringing the element of contrast in the poem. When he looks at the arcing bends in their branches, he thinks “some boy’s been swinging them”, which made them bend. He yearns for the days when he used to be “a swinger of birches”.

But the very next line chills the joy of the opening line as the speaker abandons his imaginative world and undercuts it with the harsh truths of reality. He admits that this is false for
…swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay
meaning that swinging does not bend the tree enough to cause enduring damage and acknowledges “ice-storms” as the actual cause. Over the next few lines, Frost draws an arresting picture of birch trees—their branches frozen and “loaded with ice” on
…a sunny winter morning
After a rain.
Encrusted with crystalline ice, the birches look more beautiful than they ever were. They usher both visual and auditory delight as
…They click upon themselves
as the wind goes past the ice-clad branches. This Onomatopoeia of sharp ‘c’ sound contrasts the soft delicate memories of his childhood. But their beauty is short-lived for “as the breeze rises”, the icicles, stirred so, “cracks” and thus “crazes” the shimmering splendour of the birch bark but makes them appear “many-colored” as the refracting sunlight falls on these cracks. Nature seems to be performing the potter’s art. Soon the “sun’s warmth” begins to melt them. Here, the breaking ice has been compared to shattering “crystal” that plunges down like an avalanche. They get amassed on the ground as if they were “heaps of broken glass” being swept into a dust-pan. Here the “crystal shells” have been compared to glass due to their transparency and sharpness. This is the first hint of destruction in the poem, besides the birches themselves. It seems as though “the inner dome of heaven had fallen”. This perhaps is an allusion to an apocalyptic destruction. It can also be seen a reference to Ptolemaic astronomy, which believed that the planets and stars were surrounded by crystal spheres or domes. The significance of this allusion is that the Ptolemaic model of the universe was a poetic construct – a theory of the imagination rather than facts. In this sense, Truth as Frost calls it (or modern science) has shattered the poetic imagination and replaced it with fact and Science.

The sun can also be viewed as an instrument of reality that seizes childhood and forces one into adulthood. In that sense, the “cracks” and “crazes” can be seen as a depiction of the wrinkles brought on by old age.

The poet them reflects on the Birches so bent under the weight of ice and snow that they seem to be
... dragged to the withered bracken by the load
referring to the ground with dried up ferns and shrubs as the only foliage. This is suggestive of the harsh reality. The poet says that though the trees “seem not to break”, they can never quite “right themselves” for their trunks seem to be “arching in the woods”. Frost puns when he says “they are bowed”. So, in a sense, they are broken.
Next, the poet paints a vivid picture of how these trees look when the snow thaws and leaves appear and trail on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
Here, the poet personifies the birches and compares them to girls who stand on all fours bending their heads down so as to dry their hair in the sun. This simile brings out the delicacy and vulnerability of the birches.

This being said, the poet dismisses the ice-storm as the causative agent for the condition of the birch. He wishfully imagines that “some boy bent them”, though he knows it is not true. He is aware that the ice-storm is the “Truth”, personifies it, and takes a “matter-of-fact” approach but prefers to cite swinging on the tree as the cause. This tension between what has actually happened and what the poet would like to have happened, between the real world and the world of the imagination, runs throughout Frost's poetry and gives the poem philosophical dimension and meaning far greater than that of a simple meditation on birch trees.
The speaker gives a lucid account of the lifestyle of this country boy who herds cows and lives in a remote distant village too far from the city “to learn baseball” and has no friends. Thus he seeks his happiness by inventing his own play-things. The fact that he can play in “summer or winter” shows that he is not bound by the constraints of nature, which in turn makes him as alienated from the natural world as he is from other people.
Herein, Frost begins to probe the power of his redemptive imagination as it moves from its playful phase toward the brink of dangerous transcendence. The movement into transcendence is a movement into a realm of radical imaginative freedom where all possibilities of engagement with the common realities of experience are dissolved. In its moderation, a redemptive consciousness motivates union between selves. But in its extreme forms, redemptive consciousness can become self-defeating as it presses the imaginative man into deepest isolation. The poet turns to the theme of conquest of the nature. The boy “subdues” his father’s trees “riding them” until he takes the “stiffness” out of them, emerging as the absolute victor as
…not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer.
He learns “all there was to learn” to get “to the top branches”, keeping “his poise”,
Not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground.
This poem lays particular emphasis on the “sense of sound”. The alliterative ‘l’ in these lines, coupled with the double vowel sound of ‘oo’ further stresses Frost’s urgent need for accurate timing in his quest. Written in a conversational tone, the poem constantly moves between imagination and fact, from reverie to reality. The confidence with which the young boy tackles majestic trees is juxtaposed with the rhythm of the poem. These lines encompass a detailed description of his triumph. He has to take pains similar to the care one must take “to fill a cup up to the brim and even above the brim” The boy’s conquest of the trees mirrors the victory of the poet’s imagination over the real world for the poet here talks about ways to reach beyond the limits of things to the realms beyond the real. The boy after filling the metaphorical cup above the brim, reaches the tree-top. Next, he kicks his feet so that the tree bends just enough to lower “through the air to the ground”, swinging. The lowering down on earth is not merely a physical action but a coming back to the real world after a flight of fantasy. The theme of poem seems to be, more generally and more deeply, this motion of swinging. The force behind it comes from contrary pulls—truth and imagination, earth and heaven, concrete and spirit, control and abandon, flight and return. We have the earth below, we have the world of the treetops and above, and we have the motion between these two poles. As is customary of Frost’s poems, this one too is replete with symbolism. The care taken by the boy is similar to the careful construction involved in writing a poem, making the boy’s action a parallel for the poet’s act of writing a poem.

The speaker wistfully says how he himself was once “a swinger of birches” and dreamt “of going back to be”. This yearning for the simpler days of childhood stands in sharp contrast with the pain of the adult world. He longs to return to the innocence and beauty of nature, to let it refresh him and then to return to the everyday grind of life on earth. The swinging is used to signify how a young boy does not have any worries because everything in his life just falls back into place, unlike the ice storms that are much like adulthood because once the weight drags the branches down to the ground, it is very hard for them to “right themselves”. The whole upward thrust of the poem is toward imagination, escape, and transcendence—and away from heavy truth. The downward pull is back to earth. Likely everyone understands the desire “to get away from the earth awhile”—not to reach what he seeks but to seek. The attraction of climbing trees is likewise universal. Who would not like to climb above the fray, to leave below the difficulties or drudgery of the everyday, particularly when one is
…weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood.
The poet here compares life to a forest and the word “pathless” suggests that after one point of time in life, there is no clearly-marked path and one may easily lose one’s way. It depicts the stress and loss of control over one’s life as an adult. It is the difference between the mind that seeks objective truths— irrespective of the observer— and the mind that perceives the world as having a metaphorical significance. It is the world of spirituality. It is the world of signs and visions – events have meaning. In the scientific world view, nothing is of any significance to the observer: life is like a “pathless wood”, meaningless, that randomly afflicts us with face burns, lashing us, leaving us weeping. The observer is irrelevant. In some ways, science is anathema to the poet’s way of understanding the world. It is loveless. And that’s not the world Frost values. The poet, though is not lost—he wanders alone, burdened down with the hard choices that accompany adulthood, his face burning and tickling
…with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig’s having lashed across it open.
The twig has blinded him from the simple innocent way in which he used to perceive the world as a child. The word “weeping” suggests that the tears do not simply come as a result of a cut or a bruise but because of some inner turmoil, which in turn ushers sorrow. All of these are metaphors for the hardships faced by an adult. One way to navigate “a pathless wood” is to climb a tree. But this act of climbing is not necessarily pragmatically motivated: For the boy, it is a form of play; for the man, it is a transcendent escape. In either case, climbing birches seems synonymous with imagination and the imaginative act, a push toward the ethereal, and even the contemplation of death. In one’s imagination, one may weave entire worlds; reality seldom allows one to emerge victorious.

The speaker wishes to “climb black branches up a snow-white trunk” to proceed towards “heaven”, his world of imagination. Here, the “white” birches suggest the pure and heavenly aspiration, whereas, the “black” ones suggest physical, earthly steps. The poet prudently wants to have it both ways. He does not want that “fate” should “wilfully” misunderstand him and grant him only half of his wish (that of getting away) as the other half of his wish (of getting back) is as strong. If climbing trees is a sort of push toward transcendence, then complete transcendence means never to come back down. Interestingly, he rejects the self-delusional extreme of imagination and reinforces his ties to the earth. He says, “Earth’s the right place for love,” however imperfect. He must escape to keep his sanity for it rejuvenates him; yet he must return to keep going. He wants to push to the limits of earthly possibility, but to go too far is to be lost. The upward motion requires a complement, a swing in the other direction to maintain a livable balance for he thinks that the real world makes possible the fantasies of the poetic vision. The limits of the real world may be painful, but they define one as a person—even if it is a solitary existence, it is still an existence. Just as a tree remains grounded through its roots, in the self-same manner, one must remain grounded. Without limits, there can be no “love”, or any other human emotion. The poet asserts that the real world provides the limits that make human existence and his poetry possible.

And that is why the birch tree is the perfect vehicle. As a tree, it is rooted in the ground; in climbing it, one has not completely severed ties with the earth. Moreover, as the final leap back down takes skill, experience, and courage, it is not a mere retreat but a new trajectory. Thus, one’s path up and down the birch is one that is “good both going and coming back.” According to the narrator, the best way to live life is to escape reality, take a vacation from life and it is troubles and then return to one’s roots. Perhaps the poet himself symbolizes the tree—rooted to the earth and yet seeking transcendence.
The poem’s concluding line
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches
contains darker possibilities, i.e., one could certainly “do worse” by not attempting at all. The world of Truth could be construed as the world of science and matter-of-factness – a world which circumscribes the poetic imagination. The world of the poet is one of metaphor, symbolism, allegory and myth making. At its simplest, Frost is describing two worlds and telling which he prefers and how he values each. Thus with the last line, he could almost be saying: One could do worse than be a poet.
Thus the poem concludes with the metaphysical exploration of human existence.

[Natron · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just a lovely, gentle poem about the seasons and old age. Nothing that’s trying to sound super profound or aspiring to be more than a warming read. Usually I’m quite fond of books attempting to be profound but this was refreshing probably just because it was simply a poem.

The illustrations were striking as well, you felt immersed in every page. However, one point of criticism that I’d offer would be that the paintings didn’t always match the particular part of the poem that they appeared on, but that’s really a minor point and happened maybe twice.

The language is ordinary and the metaphors never far fetched, and that is perfect for this poem.

[CH13_Kieran · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought this book was beautiful. Since seeing some of the artwork used in this book by Ed Young at the Art Institute of Chicago, I have been hoping to get my hands on this. Robert Frost, of course, incredibly, passionately and artfully wrote poetry. His poem, Birches, is brought to life in the artwork of Ed Young. This work revolves around the thoughts of a man about the birch trees of his youth. He imagines that the trees are bent by young boys swinging on them even though he knows that they are bent from ice storms.

This would be a great book for 6th to 9th graders. Even though it is a picture book, the poem of Frost would be difficult for young children to be able to understand or analyze. The artwork will help guide students in their analysis and draw them into a world of birch trees, youth and transcendence.

[Chase · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lovely poem where Robert Frost observes the hanging limbs of birches in winter, wishing that they were bent by a boy swinging on them. He knows that the ice on the branches caused them to droop, but the sight brings back memories of his own childhood where he would swing happily along branches.

However, I think the poem also alludes to his desire for escape. He states "I'd like to get away from earth awhile. And then come back to it and begin over." He also says "I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree...Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more." This may be his way of wishing for a kind of death without the permanence associated with it. The poem itself is short, but there is a lot of content here to take in and interpret.

[Whiskey Tango]

The main image of the poem is of a series of birch trees that have been bowed down so that they no longer stand up straight but rather are arched over. While the poet quickly establishes that he knows the real reason that this has happened - ice storms have weighed down the branches of the birch trees, causing them to bend over - he prefers instead to imagine that something else entirely has happened: a young boy has climbed to the top of the trees and pulled them down, riding the trees as they droop down and then spring back up over and over again until they become arched over. We bend with the weight of what has actually happened and what we would like to have happened, with the weight of the real world and the world of the imagination.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had forgotten about this poem. And then all it once it seemed really relevant. So I took it home to read out loud, in the kitchen, on the bench, while making the coffee to go.

There is an image in this poem.

You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.

And then there is this:
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm

Swoon.

[Janet Squires · Rating 5 out of 5]

Robert Frost, here in a contemplative mood, his poem given a quite background of soft impressionistic watercolors. Young has made no attempt to interpret the words with camera-crisp precision. Wisely, he offers a muted palette that gently hints at the feelings and images evoked by the words.

I'm particularly fond of this poem -- here are four of my favorite lines.

Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust --
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Two masters at work in this book. Frost's verse is a beautiful scaffolding for Young to create its visual companion, using birches' white and black to interact with dark, colored, daylit, hazy, and snowy backgrounds. The two last 2-page illustrations are the peak, with sunlight peaking through openings in the canopy, and a view across the forest from a view up in a tree. I need to circle back to read the poem on its own, but I think Young's images will be too powerfully etched to ignore them anyway.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic poem by Robert Frost beautifully illustrated with paintings of birch trees in every season and weather.

I love picture books that take one classic poem and divide it up into chunks with illustrations. Now that our schools don't bother to teach anything as boring as real poetry, dealing only with the Shel Silverstein type of flip nastiness, parents would be well advised to see out this type of beautiful language, beautifully illustrated.

[Joan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A picture book version of poet Robert Frost’s beloved and often-quoted poem. The verse blends the seen with the imagined; the illustrations, a series of paintings, complement and extend the verse.

A lovely introduction to poetry for young readers, but those who appreciate the beauty of this verse will find much to appreciate in the blending of words and pictures that work together to create a memorable reading experience.

Highly recommended.

[Baby Isabel]

Karen: We used to live near Robert Frost's farm in southern NH. The site had been abandoned and was a junk yard for years. However, it was cleaned up and restored. There were walking paths through the fields and woods. We took many hikes there. We picked up this book there. It is a great introduction to his poetry for kids.

[KarenMLISt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seriously, a work of art. There's a reason Robert Frost is one of our greatest American poets. However, I'm not sure I enjoy it as much when it's in picture-book format. I prefer my own imagery for such powerful language. However, that's just me and I respect how these lovely illustrations might enhance it for someone else.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ed Young's beautiful and sensitive paintings bring Robert Frost's poem "Birches" to life in a lovely way. His limited palette of mainly brown tones really adds to the feel of autumn--both the season and the time of the author's life; and ironically brings a lovely warmth to this cooling off time.
This is a picture book that speaks to adults; maybe even more so than to children.

[Samuel Fawcett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite simply, one of the most beautiful poems ever written.

'I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.'

[ساره ابو سالم · Rating 4 out of 5]

"
I'd like to get away from earth awhile

And then come back to it and begin over.

May no fate willfully misunderstand me

And half grant what I wish and snatch me away

Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:

I don't know where it's likely to go better.
"

[Jewelee · Rating 4 out of 5]

An illustrated version of the well-known poem about birch trees and the pleasures of climbing them.

[Ariane Kimlinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ed Young's illustrated interpretation of Robert Frost's "Birches" is a work that carries me through every winter.

[Katy Mccormac · Rating 5 out of 5]

Illustrations and a few lines for each illustration provide access to this poem about childhood memories and the symbolic birch tree.