On the surface,
"Two Tramps in Mud Time" seems to display Robert Frost's narrow
individualism. The
poem, upon first
reading it, seems incongruent, with some of the stanzas having no apparent
connection to the
whole poem. The poem as a whole also does
not appear to have a single definable
theme. At one point, the narrator seems wholly
narcissistic, and then turns to the power and beauty
of nature. It is, however, in the final third of the
poem where the narrator reveals his true
thoughts to the
reader, bringing resolution to the poem as a single entity, not merely a
disharmonious
collection of words.
At the outset of
the poem, the narrator gives a very superficial view of himself, almost seeming
angered when one
of the tramps interferes with his wood chopping: "one of them put me off
my aim".
This statement,
along with many others, seems to focus on "me" or "my",
indicating the apparrent
selfishness and
arrogance of the narrator: "The blows that a life of self-control/Spares
to strike
for the common
good/That day, giving a loose to my soul,/I spent on the unimportant
wood." The
narrator refers
to releasing his suppressed anger not upon evils that threaten "the common
good",
but upon the
"unimportant wood". The
appparent arrogance of the narrator is revealed as well by
his reference to
himself as a Herculean figure standing not alongside nature, but over it:
"The grip
on earth of
outspread feet,/The life of muscles rocking soft/And smooth and moist in vernal
heat."
Unexpectedly, the
narrator then turns toward nature, apparently abandoning his initial train of
thought. He reveals the unpredictability of nature,
saying that even in the middle of spring, it
can be "two
months back in the middle of March."
Even the fauna of the land is involved with this
chicanery; the
arrival of the bluebird would to most indicate the arrival of spring, yet
"he
wouldn't advise a
thing to blossom." The narrator
points to the conclusion that, while on the
surface, things
appear to be one thing, there is always something hidden below, much like
"The
lurking frost in
the earth beneath..."
In the final
three stanzas of the poem, the "frost" within the narrator comes to
the surface. The
humility of the
narrator comes to light, with the narrator saying that the tramps' right to
chop
wood for a living
"was the better right--agreed."
The narrator also says, "Except as a fellow
handled an
ax,/They had no way of knowing a fool," insomuch as admitting to his
foolishness.
On the surface,
the poem seems to be two poems with diverging themes. However, Robert Frost guides
there two
apparently unrelated thoughts into one idea from the heart: "My object in
living is to
unite/My
avocation and my vocation/As my two eyes make one in sight." Perhaps the narrator is the
true Frost coming
to the surface.
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