One would also be forced to go around the “anemones.” This word is wide-ranging and refers to an expansive genus of flowers. It can also refer to a type of common shrub that grows wild. Now, if one was searching for it, they would have to go “underneath the coppice and heath.” Here, the speaker is referencing a wooded area that is annually cut back to stimulate growth and “heath,” or the opposite.

Trees have been planted and grown up around the path, helping to obscure what was left of the path. If one was to come upon this place now, unaware of the history, they would not know that there was “once a road through the woods.” Nature has taken back the area that humans had claimed. Since the time the road was closed the “Weather and rain” have ”undone it.” Due to the fact that it wasn’t maintained, the elements have almost erased it entirely. Although seventy years have passed since anyone was able to traverse this path the speaker remembers it well. The poem begins with the speaker stating that one particular road was “shut…Seventy years ago.” This first line is spoken as if the reader already has prior knowledge of the road. Kipling’s speaker concludes the poem by describing all the things that one might see if they were to enter the woods at night.Īnalysis of The Way Through the Woods Stanza One The keeper is able to see the secret interactions of animals and exist among them freely. In the next lines, the speaker discusses the “keeper” of the woods and what this person has access to that he does not. The entire area has been reclaimed by nature. It was seventy years ago that “they” got rid of it, Since that time there have been new trees planet and exponential growth from the plants that still lived there. The poem begins with the speaker stating that there used to be a road in the woods here. ‘The Way Through the Woods’ by Rudyard Kipling describes the changes that have come over one particular plot of forest. The speaker appreciates this fact, but the text still speaks to a yearning to see the woods first hand. They no longer remember or fear the “men” that used to travel the path. Trees have been replanted and animals have returned. On the other hand, the closure has caused a resurgence in the surrounding life. With its disappearance, one no longer has access to the beautiful moments and creatures that exist within the forest. On one level he is mourning the loss of the path. When reading this piece it is easy to sense a conflict in the speaker. The same occurs between “trees” and “anemones” in lines six and eight. There are also moments such as that between lines two and four where the words “ago” and “know” rhyme.

This can be seen through the repetition of the end word “woods.” It appears at the end of seven of the twenty-five lines. Instead, there are instances of rhyme scattered throughout the lines. Kipling has chosen not to structure this piece with one particular rhyme scheme. ‘The Way Through the Woods’ by Rudyard Kipling is a two stanza poem made up of one stanza of twelve lines and another of thirteen.

A way to the woods