In “Desert Places,” Robert Frost describes snow falling on a field as darkness falls in passing. At first glance, this appears to be a simplistic idealistic image of nature. However, beneath the surface of the snow, frost infuses darker shades into this pastoral place. Dark undertones betray feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, suffocation and loneliness, all common symptoms of depression. “Desert Places” uses the elements of its winter landscape as parallels to the symptoms and effects of mental depression. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay Just as depression can quickly threaten a person, nighttime comes upon the speaker admiring the field. The “night falls quickly, oh, quickly” on the speaker. The “oh” and the repetition of “fast” create a feeling of hopelessness and uncontrollability of the situation. A common symptom of depression is hopelessness, and related to this is the fact that the person speaking has no control over the nightfall or the snowfall. “Loneliness includes [the speaker] without him realizing it,” which shows how little control the speaker has over the situation. They are unable to stop the loneliness from covering them as night and snow cover the fields. The speaker states that "the ground [is] almost covered with snow" and that "the animals are suffocated in their dens." Everything is enveloped by snow, just as the speaker is passively enveloped by solitude. The feeling of being blanketed, suffocated and suffocated is comparable to the effects of depression on a person. They feel burdened by depression, just as living beings and plants in the field are burdened by winter. In a sense, depression plunges those who suffer from it into an emotional winter, ending all life. The feeling of suffocation is also linked to the idea of ​​burial and evokes ideas of death. It seems that the burial of all these plants and animals is linked to the burial of a dead person. Maybe it can even be considered suicidal. Everything that happens on the ground is buried and covered up, and this corresponds to the many effects of the depression. The woven rhyme scheme of AABA CCDC EEFE GGHG also creates the feeling of cover. If one were to draw a line through each stanza, from each rhyming word to the next, it would create an arc above the third line, hovering over it. The dominant rhyme of each stanza drowns out the one word that does not rhyme; he gets lost in the sound of the dominant rhyme. Yet, the rhyme scheme of each stanza is independent of each other, showing the lack of connection between the speaker and his life. Even though everything seems to be clicking, it really isn't. Although the motif remains, the sound of the rhymes does not change, which only seems to further show the lack of connection between the speaker and their emotional state. Depression causes a person to become disconnected from their life and the rhyme scheme reflects this. The speaker also states that they are "distracted." The “spirit” of the self is considered the breath of life, the animating or vital principle of man; Yet the speaker realizes that his own is withdrawn and that he has passively become a victim of darkness, loneliness, and depression. The fact that the speaker is “distracted to count” can mean many things. If we take the speaker as Robert Frost, this could mean counting beats and feet in a poem. It can also mean to include in something, as in “count on me.” In this sense, the speaker would address the fact that they are too withdrawn to be included in thelife activities. Again, this is all comparable to the effects of depression. The speaker is too withdrawn, too stifled in his own emotional winter to be apart from the events and actions of his life. They are lost in their own field of winter depression; they are the foliage and animals smothered in the darkness of the snow of the depression. We can't stop the sun going down or the snow falling, just as the speaker feels he can't stop his depression. There is so much movement throughout the first two stanzas even though there is nothing alive on the ground. Night falls, snow falls, and the speaker passes. The feeling of movement creates restlessness in the poem and puts the reader almost on edge, just as depression does to the sufferer. Frost succeeds in plunging the reader into depression. The reader should also note that there is all this action without anything actually living. When we are depressed, we act without feeling, without life, just as nature acts without anything living. Plants died under the snow, “animals are suffocated” under the snow. Everything seems to be moving, but nothing is alive. As the evening turns to night, the snow clouds dissipate and the movement of the poem stops. During this moment of pause, the speaker reflects on the unchanging blanket of snow and the stars in the sky. The speaker declares that the “whiter whiteness of snow plunged into night” has “no expression” and “nothing to express.” “Benighted” here can literally mean the way the domain is taken over by the darkness of night, but can also figuratively mean being involved in intellectual or moral darkness. The darkness leaves the snow and the speaker expressionless and empty, and even leaves them with "nothing to express." This is linked to depression's ability to rob us of the pleasure of life and create a feeling of numbness. The stars left in the sky only seem to highlight the empty spaces between them for the speaker. The speaker may not be addressing their hopeful light, nor their beauty, he is only relating them to the empty space of the field and loneliness. There is no human race up there, there is no camaraderie, and once again loneliness reigns. He personifies all natural elements by stating: "They cannot frighten me with their empty spaces." » The speaker here reflects that all the darkness and solitude of nature are nothing compared to the darkness and solitude of his mind. He says: “I have it in me so much closer to home/To scare me with my own desert places.” » Just as snow leaves the field deserted and dark, depression does the same to the sufferer. However, the last stanza can also be seen as ironically positive compared to the previous stanzas. If the winter landscape is a metaphor for depression, then the fact that its empty spaces do not frighten the speaker can be seen as a good thing. Perhaps the speaker is saying that beyond all this, there is hope that he will prevail. Additionally, “desert” can also mean deserving and worthy of merit. Perhaps the speaker is ironically using the double meaning of the word to assert that it is the dark, uninhabited places within himself that earn him merit. Perhaps it is not the desolation within him that frightens him, but rather his merit. The statement “And as lonely as it is, loneliness/Will be lonelier before it is less” shows that the speaker believes that the situation can only get worse before it gets better. The reader may see this as positive; perhaps the speaker realizes that this loneliness and depression will disappear. The poem's many contrasting images continue to bounce the reader between.