"Frequently the wood are pink" By Emily Dickinson [Analysis]

Frequently the wood are pink --[1] Frequently are brown.[2] Frequently the hills undress[3] Behind my native town.[4] Oft a head is crested[5] I was wont to see --[6] And as oft a cranny[7] Where it used to be --[8] And the Earth -- they tell me --[9] On its Axis turned![10] Wonderful Rotation![11] By but twelve performed![12]
1858 (Emily is twenty seven. She writes 51 poems) Poem 6 F24 "Frequently the woods are pink" Analysis by David Preest [Poem]

Ruth Miller offers the following acute reading of a seemingly simple poem. The poet describes seasonal change twice. Firstly she mentions the pink blossom of spring, the brown tree trunks of autumn and the bare hills of winter (lines 1-4). Secondly she describes the head of a tree, which in summer has its full crest of leafage, but which when reduced to trunk and branches in winter, provides a cranny through which we can see (lines 5-8). Finally she concludes how amazing it is that this passage of the four seasons in their twelve months, which we know so well and see so clearly, is connected with still greater cycles in nature, which we do not see and have to be told about (lines 9-12). Nature is personified in this poem: the hills undress, and the months perform, as upon a stage, their changes.
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