Dust of Snow

About the poet – Robert Frost is a well - known  American poet. His work was initially published in England before it was published in America.

Introduction & Theme of the poem – Through the poem Dust of Snow Robert Frost is trying to shatter all the believes that humans have about the things that they consider ill – omens. He tells this through the example of a crow that is considered as a bad omen and signifier of darkness and gloominess.  He also tries to put forward the view that sometimes even small things or incidents in life have big impact on us.

SUMMARY

The way a crow

Shook down on me

The dust of snow

From a hemlock tree

1) Dust – cover lightly with a powdered substance, here it means to dust the snow from tree.

2) Hemlock - a highly poisonous European plant of the parsley family, with a purple-spotted stem, fernlike leaves, small white flowers, and an unpleasant smell.

In the following stanza Robert Frost implies that it is a very dull, gloomy day and everything represents darkness, for instance he talks about a crow here that shook dust of snow on the him from a hemlock tree. The crow is generally considered a symbol of darkness and bad omen whereas a hemlock tree because of being a poisonous one never represents something good and is instead a signifier of death. We are unsure of what movement of the crow the branches of the snow laden tree shake and the snow falls on the poet Through all these dark metaphors he sets the mood for rest of the poem.