ON MY WALK THIS MORNING, I bumped into Robert Frost. “I thought you were dead,” I said. “No, I just ran out of rhyme,” he moaned. “What are you doing in Florida?” I asked him. “Is that where I am?” “I’m afraid so,” I told him. “I thought that I took the road less traveled,” he said, smiling sadly. “Afraid not,” I said. “Florida is the nation’s third most populace state.” “Oh my,” said Frost, “perhaps the road not taken is where I should have gone.” “That might have been better,” I suggested, “because I doubt there are any poets in Florida.” He ran his gnarled fingers through his thick white hair, looking around. “Which way is north?” he asked me. I pointed. “Well, I’m off,” he said, and started down a new road. “With luck, by November I’ll once again be stopping by the woods on a snowy evening.” I smiled and nodded at him as he trudged away from me. Then I came home to read some poetry.
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere 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.
