Range-finding
Range-finding - form Summary
A Volta Links Two Scenes
Frost frames two brief, parallel vignettes within the tight confines of a sonnet: in the first, a battlefield bullet destroys a flower near a bird’s nest and a displaced butterfly briefly tries to rest; in the second, a passing shot knocks dew from a spider’s web, depriving the spider of prey. The sonnet form concentrates these small natural losses into a single compressed moral impression. The turn after line eight shifts the focus from the flower and bird to the web and spider, linking incidental wartime violence to everyday natural consequences.
Read Complete AnalysesThe battle rent a cobweb diamond-strung And cut a flower beside a ground bird’s nest Before it stained a single human breast. The stricken flower bent double and so hung. And still the bird revisited her young. A butterfly its fall had dispossessed A moment sought in air his flower of rest, Then lightly stooped to it and fluttering clung. On the bare upland pasture there had spread O’ernight ‘twixt mullein stalks a wheel of thread And straining cables wet with silver dew. A sudden passing bullet shook it dry. The indwelling spider ran to greet the fly, But finding nothing, sullenly withdrew.
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