Blank verse: Frost composed “Birches” in blank verse—unrhymed iambic pentameter. It extends for 160 lines without any stanza breaks. This continuous, often enjambed structure gives the poem a flowing, prose-like form in certain sections. This allows the poem to imitate the internal dialogue so central to its unfolding narrative. It also gives the poem an unrelenting quality that also has a thematic significance: just as the speaker cannot suspend time in his desire for transcendence, readers cannot suspend the poem’s riparian surge.
"though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:..."See in text(Text of the Poem)
This description of the birches represents an example of both personification and the pathetic fallacy. The speaker subtly imagines the birches as people “bowed/so low for long, they never right themselves.” As the poem unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear that the speaker views himself as such a person, particularly when comparing himself to the carefree, birch-swinging boy he once was.
"They are dragged to the withered..."See in text(Text of the Poem)
Here Frost employs musical language to convey the image of the birches’ being weighed down by the freight of the snow and ice. Notice the string of liquid consonants—r and l sounds—as well as the subtle rhyme of “dragged” and “bracken,” which are connected by both assonance and the consonant pairing between g and ck. The particular suggestion here is that the collapse of heaven, made vivid in the prior line, is followed by a heavy, terrestrial sojourn. This thematic shift from heaven to earth is the central narrative of the poem. The speaker, an adult weighed down by the responsibilities of life, recollects his childhood experiences, which were comparatively heavenly.
