“Frost at Midnight” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

“Frost at Midnight” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge is a free verse poem.  There are twenty-two lines in the first stanza, twenty-one lines in the next two stanzas and then ten lines in the last stanza.  In the second stanza there is a ceasura at the beginning where it says “But O!”   It is an end-stopped poem.  The poem is euphonious which is it has easy and nice sounds.  Very soft as to note the stillness and silence of the night.

This poem reminded me of my sister.  She is one year old and she fights sleep.  If I have her for the night, I have to work hard to get her to sleep.  She will fight and fight just not wanting to miss anything.  Finally when I do get her to sleep, it seems almost too quiet in the house to be good.  Once she goes to sleep its so nice because she is finally exhausted and will sleep good and so am I.  Its a nice time to admire her beautifulness and laugh about how she is getting a personality. 

I didn’t fully understand this poem, but that could be because I’m a bit tired.  The word choice he uses is spectacular, even if it doesn’t all make sense to me.  At the end of the second stanza, when he is talking, I think, about his dream, it almost sounds like Alice in Wonderland.  After awhile it goes back to the baby and how the baby is precious.  I have always wondered what it feels like to be a parent.  I mean, I’ve been a big sister for 11 of my 18 years and feeling the overwhelming of loving my siblings so much is amazing.  I can imagine what a parent feels knowing they made this special gift that they are holding.