World Poetry Day ~ two of my favorite poems

World Poetry Day is celebrated on March 21 to encourage us to write poetry, read poetry, and share poetry with friends and family.

Do you have a favorite poem?  I often ponder "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost, asking myself "what if?" questions:  What if I had chosen that instead of this?  What if I'd done that other thing, rather than what I did?  Here's the poem:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

If asked to recite a poem or think of a favorite, however, I usually share Emily Dickinson's whimsical "I'm Nobody! Who Are You?" which was first published in 1891.

I’m Nobody! Who are you?

Are you – Nobody – too?

Then there’s a pair of us!

Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!

How dreary – to be – Somebody!

How public – like a Frog –

To tell one’s name – the livelong June –

To an admiring Bog!

Oh, well, BOTH of these are favorites.  How's that for not choosing one?  I've blogged about both poems before.  Click on the titles, if you want to read more.