Question

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

Usisng evidence from the text explain what roads symbolize in this poem

Answer 1

The roads in the poem symbolize life’s choices and the decision points we all face, including their uncertainty, consequences, and the way we later make meaning of them. Evidence from the text:

- A decision point: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood” establishes a fork — a moment when a choice must be made.
- The impossibility of doing both: “And sorry I could not travel both / And be one traveler” shows that one must pick a single path and accept the trade‑offs.
- Uncertainty about outcomes: the speaker can look “as far as I could / To where it bent in the undergrowth,” implying you cannot fully see where a choice will lead.
- The appearance vs. reality of choices: he takes the road “because it was grassy and wanted wear,” yet immediately admits “Had worn them really about the same,” suggesting that options often seem different at first but may be similar in reality.
- Irreversibility and onward movement: “I kept the first for another day! … I doubted if I should ever come back” and “how way leads on to way” indicate that choices lead to further choices and usually can’t be undone.
- Retrospective meaning: “I shall be telling this with a sigh … I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference” shows how people later interpret and assign significance to the paths they took; the “sigh” is ambiguous, signaling either regret or satisfaction.

Taken together, these lines make the roads metaphors for decisions, their unknown outcomes, the necessity of choosing, and the human tendency to narrate and justify our choices afterward.