Is It a Sonnet?
Robert Frost’s “Acquainted with the Night” is mostly written in terza rima—a series of three-line stanzas, where the first and third line rhyme, and the second line of each stanza becomes the rhyme word for the next stanza (aba bcb cdc ded, etc.). But, oddly, Frost ends his poem, not with a terza rima stanza, but with a couplet that reminds us of the memorable conclusions to Shakespeare’s greatest sonnets. Had Frost ended with terza rima we would have a fifteen line poem. The couplet brings it down to fourteen lines, again reminding us of the sonnet.
How Does the Form Affect Your Reading of the Poem?
If we play a little with “Acquainted with the Night” by deleting all but one stanza break, it looks like this:
I have been one acquainted with the night.Configured this way, Frost’s poem is very close to being a perfect Shakespearian sonnet. The only line that doesn’t work is the eighth (“cry” doesn’t rhyme with “explain”). But Frost loved to break expected patterns, and the line itself—with its “interrupted cry”—is about breaking mood, coming from a different street, a different world (in this case the world of terza rima?).
I have walked out in rain — and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.
I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.
I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,
But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky
Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.
It seems to me that Frost is having the best of both formal worlds. The short terza rima stanzas give “Acquainted with the Night” a start and stop rhythm that is appropriate for a man taking a late night walk, observing and meditating on the things he sees and hears as he proceeds. The fourteen lines with their strong sense of octet and sestet; the sonnet-like “turn” in the 8th to 9th lines (both a literal turn from “another street” and a change in the direction and mood of the poem); and the final encapsulating couplet provide sonnet bone-structure to the terza rima flesh of the poem. This counterpoint brings originality, complexity, tension, and depth to the night that Frost so powerfully acquaints us with.
Lessons Learned
It’s a unique configuration for a poem that is also unusual in its subject matter. Frost is, after all, the great rural poet, famous for his snow and streams and pastures; his woods, birds, and flowers. “Acquainted with the Night” is one of his rare “urban” poems where he outwalks “the furthest city light” and looks down “the saddest city lane.” It is a poem coming not from Derry but from Boston—a poem of “houses” and “streets” rather than farma and pastures. The atypical subject matter is perhaps what inspired Frost to bring sonnet and terza rima together in one poem.
