I left you in the morning,
And in the morning glow,
You walked a way beside me
To make me sad to go.
Do you know me in the gloaming,
Gaunt and dusty grey with roaming?
Are you dumb because you know me not,
Or dumb because you know?
All for me? And not a question
For the faded flowers gay
That could take me from beside you
For the ages of a day?
They are yours, and be the measure
Of their worth for you to treasure,
The measure of the little while
That I’ve been long away.
In My Own Words
As I was leaving you one morning, you walked beside me for a while in the glow of the sun. It was as if you were trying to get me to stay. When I returned, you were silent. Do you recognize me in the twilight? Do you recognize me through the dirt I’m covered with, and despite my frail appearance? Are you quiet because you recognize me, or because you don’t?
You are asking all these questions about me? You don’t have any questions about the flowers in my hand, which are the things that have kept me from you for so long? These flowers are for you. They are yours, and you can measure their worth against the pain of the time we have been separated.
Analysis
This poem is about a man who has gone off to do something noble, so that the life he shares with his wife maintains its beauty. The noble act is up to interpretation, but the essential ideas are not—absence, longing, and devotion.
The poem begins with the speaker’s departure, and the wife’s sadness. And then, mid-stanza, there is a passage of time. In one of the most lyrical phrases I’ve ever read, “Do you know me in the gloaming, Gaunt and dusty grey with roaming,” we see his longing and devotion born out through fearful doubt. We know that it has been more than just a day, because he wonders if his wife can recognize him—he has even become “gaunt.” Later, he refers to the flowers he has gathered as “faded.” Readers understand that, whatever he has been doing, it has been hard, and it has taken a long time.
Speechless, his wife stares at him. Has she been struck dumb because she cannot believe it is really him? Or is she truly unable to recognize him in the twilight, covered with dust and changed from his journey?
The silence is broken in the second stanza, and the loving wife only has questions about how he is. She does not mention the flowers—the things he was out gathering for “the ages of a day.” (Another beautiful phrase!) He presents them to her, declaring that she was the reason he was gone for so long. He was getting flowers for her. After much time and tribulation, he remains steadfast in his devotion to her.
It seems likely that Frost was not writing about gathering literal flowers, although a literal interpretation of the words still carries sweetness. Rather, it seems far more likely that the flowers are symbolic of an ideal. The speaker was out in the world, working hard in service of a beautiful cause, and he was doing it in order to provide or preserve the beautiful life he enjoys with his love.
When I have shared this poem with students, we have imagined the possibilities of what the journey could be. We have also discussed the possibility that he was really only gone for one day that felt quite long because of how difficult it was, and the text supports that reading, too. We have talked about everything from literally gathering flowers, to going to work, to defending a country in war. I have also been known to share this alongside The Scarlet Pimpernel, and have compared Frost’s speaker to that noble and enigmatic adventurer. After studying this poem, one of my students was inspired to write a long story about a sailor who was kept away from his love for seven years, but when he returned, he brought back a necklace made of jewels he found in a shipwreck at the bottom of the sea.
While it is not possible from the content of the poem to determine what exactly the speaker was off doing, that is okay—that is not the point. The point is the speaker’s loving devotion. This poem is the presentation of a tender reunion between two people who are devoted to each other, despite long absences.
Robert Frost, that rugged yet sensitive farmer, has a direct line to my heart. This is one of my favorites of his poems—perhaps my top favorite of his. I have this poem committed to memory, and recite it often while walking or while waiting through a boring task. I hope you love it, too.