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Poem 1 - A Girl’s Garden (Appreciation)Making of the Garden of Life'A Girl's Garden' by Robert Frost expresses the unique pleasures of rural childhood. It is the realization of a little girl's dream of planting a garden. The speaker is a neighbor of the girl, who is now an adult woman living in town. The speaker tells the story, attempting to convey the importance of the garden to the adult woman and the joy she derives from recollecting her experiences.The girl remembers fondly her experience of having once done a childlike thing. She had yearned to make a garden of her own. Her father found a piece of land and asked the little girl to work all by herself on it. Accepting the challenge, she started working earnestly in the hope of growing the garden of her dreams. The father in fact directs the girl onto the path of self-discovery. The walled off piece of useless land does not dishearten her. On the other hand, it instils in her young mind the courage to dream and make the dream come true. She asks everyone for seeds, resulting in her planting 'one of all things but weed'. 'Her crop was a miscellany', 'a little bit of everything a great deal of none'. The innocence of the child is highlighted through the description of the embarrassment that the girl feels while carting her 'not nice load'. Regardless of the outcome of the garden, the theme of the poem is the learning experience and the pleasure the woman feels even as an adult.Brilliant imagery and steady rhythm makes the poem a perfect example of how effortlessly Brilliant imagery and steady rhythm makes the poem a perfect example of how effortlessly a story can be told in verse. The poem follows the rhyme scheme abcb. The tone of the poem is consistently soft and pleasant expressing the innocence of the young girl. The garden, the reader realizes is a teaching ground for the girl teaching her interesting facts of life.ExplanationFrost's "A Girl's Garden"A neighbor of mine in the villageLikes to tell how one springWhen she was a girl on the farm, she did A childlike thing.One day she asked her fatherTo give her a garden plotsTo plant and tend and reap herself, And he said, "Why not?"In casting about for a corner He thought of an idle bitOf walled-off ground where a shop had stood, And he said, "Just it."And he said, "That ought to make youAn ideal one-girl farm,And give you a chance to put some strength On your slim-jim arm."It was not enough of a garden Her father said, to plow;So she had to work it all by hand, But she don't mind now.She wheeled the dung in a wheelbarrow Along a stretch of road;But she always ran away and left Her not-nice load,And hid from anyone passing. And then she begged the seed.She says she thinks she planted oneOf all things but weed.A hill each of potatoes, Radishes, lettuce, peas,Tomatoes, beets, beans, pumpkins, corn,And even fruit trees.And yes, she has long mistrustedThat a cider-appleIn bearing there today is hers,Or at least may be.Her crop was a miscellany When all was said and done,A little bit of everything, A great deal of none.Now when she sees in the villageHow village things go,Just when it seems to come in right, She says, "I know!"It's as when I was a farmer..."Oh never by way of advice!And she never sins by telling the taleTo the same person twice.Robert Frost's narrative poem portrays the speaker's neighbor, who likes to tell a little tale to villagers about growing and maintaining a garden whilst she was still just a girl.This delightful narrative reveals Robert Frost at his best as he has his speaker recount an old woman's experience with a youthful endeavor in gardening on her family farm.The poem features 12 quatrains, each with the rime scheme, ABCB.Quatrains 1-3: "A neighbor of mine in the village"Robert Frost's speaker in "A Girl's Garden" is relating a conversation he once had with "a neighbor of mine in the village." According to the speaker, the woman is quite fond of recounting an experience from her childhood about "a childlike thing" she did when she lived on a farm.One spring, the woman when still a child asks her father if she could have a few acres of land to plant and nurture her own garden, a suggestion to which the father readily agrees. The father goes over the farm and eventually decides on a certain plot of land he deems appropriate for his young offspring's endeavor. The plot of land is "walled-off" and at one time "a shop had stood" there.Quatrains 4-6: "And he said, "That ought to make you"The father tells his daughter that the plot he has chosen for her farming endeavor should be just right for her; that piece of land should "make [her] / An ideal one-girl farm." The father further adds that by working that plot she could strengthen her arms. The father is also determined that the plot was too small to plough; thus, she had to dig it up and get the dirty ready by hand.But she was very enthusiastic about the task and did not mind all that work. The woman recounts that she transported the fertilizer in a wheelbarrow along the road to her plot of land, but the smell of the "dung" always made her run away.Quatrains 7-9: "And hid from anyone passing"The woman recounts that she would hide so no one would anyone see her fleeing from the smell of dung. Then she continues her tale, informing her listener that she acquired some seeds to plant, and she "thinks she planted one / Of all things" except weeds. She plants "potatoes, radishes, lettuce, peas / Tomatoes, beets, beans, pumpkins, corn, / And even fruit trees."And even though she planted only one of each, that is still a lot for such a small plot of land. She reports that today there is a "cider apple tree" growing in the plot that she suspects might be from her planting experience.Quatrains 10-12: "Her crop was a miscellany"The woman freely admits that she did reap many different crops but not much of each. Now, when the woman observes the successful gardens grown on small plots in the village, she recounts how she once grew a fine garden on a small plot of land.The speaker of this narration is delighted and probably astounded that the woman never repeats her story to "the same person twice," as most nostalgic seniors are wont to do. ................
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