Into My Own
Collection - A Boys' Will. 1915
One of my wishes is that those dark trees,
So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze,
Were not, as 'twere, the merest mask of gloom,
But stretched away unto the
edge of doom.
I should not be withheld but that some day
into their vastness I should steal away,
Fearless of ever finding open land,
or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand.
I do not see why I should e'er turn back,
Or those should not set forth upon my track
To overtake me, who should miss me here
And long to know if still I held them dear.
They would not find me changed from him they knew--
Only more sure of all I thought was true.
A wistful poem. The first image – that of dark, firm trees that appear
as a ‘mask of gloom’ and the image of the slow wheel pouring
out sand set the mood of the poem – gloomy, dark and monotonous.
It is this world that he wishes to ‘steal’ away from (die) and never ‘turn back’ – have no regrets. Because it is a dull and monotonous life. And he has no fear of the life at the edge of doom. But he ends the poem with a positive note - his confidence in his own beliefs, his love. Even in the world yonder he would neither lose his love for those he holds dear nor change his beliefs. While writing this, both ‘love’ and ‘beliefs’ may have meant the same for RF. He seems to be challenging those who love him to test his love for them. They might follow him or overtake – that is, die after or before him - but in the next world too they can be sure of his love.
In 1913, when this poem was published in A Boy’s Will, RF was nearing 40 years of age. A death wish seems unlikely though not impossible but the pensive outlook is hard to miss. Just a year back he had made the famous move to England, which had made all the difference to his career as a poet. The poem may have been written much earlier during his days of struggle at the Derry Farm. His difficult childhood, his financial and emotional problems after his school years and his failed efforts to farm at the Derry Farm, New Hampshire coupled with the initial rejection he received in England by the Atlantic Monthly editor may have contributed to these dark thoughts.
The title of the collection A Boy’s Will is taken from Longfellow’s
My Lost Youth, where he wrote:
A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.
Consider the contrast with the later poem Birches (Mountain Interval, 1916).
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
….
… Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
The brashness and fearlessness of youth is evident in RF’s thoughts
in Into my Own whereas in Birches he’s almost afraid that his wish
to go away from earth may be granted:
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return.
Click on the poems to read their analysis.
Birches
Mowing
Into my Own
Putting in the Seed
Going for Water
Nothing Gold Can Stay
Fragmentary Blue
Reluctance