Robert Frost (1874-1963)
The Road Not Taken
1Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
2And sorry I could not travel both
3And be one traveler, long I stood
4And looked down one as far as I could
5To where it bent in the undergrowth;
6Then took the other, as just as fair,
7And having perhaps the better claim,
8Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
9Though as for that the passing there
10Had worn them really about the same,
11And both that morning equally lay
12In leaves no step had trodden black.
13Oh, I kept the first for another day!
14Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
15I doubted if I should ever come back.
16I shall be telling this with a sigh
17Somewhere ages and ages hence:
18Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
19I took the one less traveled by,
20And that has made all the difference.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Robert Frost, Mountain Interval (New York: Henry Holt, 1921), pp. 9. PS 3511 R94 M6 ROBA.
First publication date:
1916
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 2:2002/1/16
Rhyme: abaab
Other poems by Robert Frost
