In Robert frost's poem, Acquainted with the Night, the total amount of lines present in this poem is fourteen, which makes this a sonnet. The traditional iambic pentameter of a sonnet can be seen along with internal rhymes. Sonnets are traditionally and commonly used for love poetry, however this poem constantly presses an aura of sadness upon the reader.
Robert Frost bares his very soul to the reader in this heartrending poem, but he opens with a simple, matter-of-fact statement. "I have become one acquainted with the night.". The statement says so little and yet so much. He is acquainted with the dark- the gloom, the fear, and most of all the loneliness of the night hours. The narrator, like so many of us, has had his share of the darker side of human experience. He is well acquainted with the night of sorrow, suffering, and human misery. Robert Frost also begins every sentence of which there are only seven with "I" which clearly represents isolation.
In the second verse of the first stanza, the poet mentions the rain. The rain symbolizes both happiness and prosperity which could mean that the narrator has been through the best and the worst of times while in the third verse of the first stanza: "I have outwalked the furthest city light". The word "light" in this verse could symbolize optimism, hope and opportunity and so one can interpret this verse as being that the narrator has lived and enjoyed the best of his life and that he has explored all the limits of human accomplishments. The word "light" in this verse could also depict safety and so to "have out walked the furthest city light" refers to going beyond the safety of the light and the companionship of the city. This first stanza sets the solemn and solitary mood for the poem.
In the second stanza the narrator describes "look(ing) down the saddest lane". However, Frost uses the word "looked" which means that the narrator could have been depressed but not completely miserable. If Frost were to describe the narrator as being extremely sad he would have used the word "walked" instead of "looked".
Part of the second stanza, the narrator describes passing "the watchman on his beat and (dropping his) eyes, unwilling to explain". "The watchman" in this part of the stanza could depict God and so one can assume that the narrator has done something or involved in something undesirable and therefore was unable to meet his eyes.
In the third stanza, the speaker hears "an interrupted cry" in the far off distance. He stands still to listen and the sound of his feet stops, but the cry is too distant to make out clearly. The physical distance seems to be a metaphor for emotional distance. The speaker has been rejected or a rejecter of someone in the past, perhaps a lover.
In the fourth stanza, the sentence of the third stanza continues. This continuation is an unusual break from the mainly short sentences of the fist two stanzas. Here, the narrator emphasizes negativity by the lengthy line seeming to drag out and dwell on the topic, and by telling the "cry" was not to comfort him by making him feel neither needed nor wanted. The narrator then describes the moon as a time keeper. It is "One," "against the sky" as if it was viewed as signally opposing a huge unknown (the night sky). Also, by the moon being a luminous "clock" it is bright and almost a positive image while keeping order.
Unlike the "watchman" the moon does not seem to be a judgmental figure. The moon is the closest thing to a positive image in the whole poem. In the ending stanza, the moon declares "the time" to be "neither wrong nor right." This appears to make this negative experience for the narrator a passing phase instead of a permanent state. It makes an indecisive, unclear statement which seems to justify and satisfy the narrator.
The last line is the same as the first line. This adds to the theme of mystery and darkness of the poem.
This poem seems to have the classic quest design in which the narrator's night walk is symbolic of isolation and detachment from his surroundings in both social and natural aspects, but there is no concrete answer to end the quest. The separation from man to man or man to God (the watchman and the cry) and from man to nature (the unreachable moon) has a constant effect on humanity in this poem. The separation and negativity in this poem is oddly deliberate by the narrator and seems to directly parallel the strange short and then long sentences and internal rhymes all crammed into the varied form of a sonnet. The only conclusion given by the poem is that of acceptance. It seems that after the dark journey of searching the streets and the soul, the narrator was forced to realize that there is not an answer that will cure his isolation and detachment from society. The ending rhymes of the last two lines "right" and "night" seem to echo like a sigh of relief as if the narrator is pleased these thoughts are over and are memories.
