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Robert Frost's "For Once, Then, Something" · The Daily Poem

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  [music]
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  SPEAKER_00: welcome back to the daily poem a podcast from goldberry studios i'm sean johnson
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  SPEAKER_00: and today is wednesday july 8th 2026 today's poem is by robert frost it's called
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  SPEAKER_00: for once then something i'll read it once offer a few comments
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  SPEAKER_00: and read it one more time
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  SPEAKER_00: for once then something
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  SPEAKER_00: others taunt me with having knelt
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  SPEAKER_00: at well curbs
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  SPEAKER_00: always wrong to the light so never seeing deeper down in the well than where
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  SPEAKER_00: the water gives me back
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  SPEAKER_00: and a shining surface picture me myself in the summer heaven godlike looking out of a wreath
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  SPEAKER_00: of ferns and cloud puffs once i'm trying with chin against a well curb i discerned as i thought
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  SPEAKER_00: beyond the picture through the picture a something white uncertain something more of the depths
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  SPEAKER_00: thank you
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  SPEAKER_00: and then i lost it water came to rebuke the too clear water one drop fell from
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  SPEAKER_00: a fern and lo a ripple shook whatever it was lay there
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  SPEAKER_00: at bottom blurred it blotted it out what was that whiteness truth a pebble of quartz
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  SPEAKER_00: for once then something i want to call this poem
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  SPEAKER_00: a sonnet or something like a sonnet even though it has 15 lines it has
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  SPEAKER_00: a very regular meter it has a turn near the end thematically and even in the way
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  SPEAKER_00: that the images sort of focus and become more concrete in those final lines and
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  SPEAKER_00: the 15th line becomes a
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  SPEAKER_00: the something the unexpected discovery at the end of what might normally be
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  SPEAKER_00: a 14 line poem just like the unexpected discovery at the bottom of the well
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  SPEAKER_00: which is both a very concrete and earthy image it's in deep water it is perhaps
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  SPEAKER_00: a stone but is also because of the brilliant symmetry uh spatial symmetry and
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  SPEAKER_00: symmetry of images that frost constructs here it's also a transcendent even
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  SPEAKER_00: a heavenly image the speaker is leaning over a well on a summer day and
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  SPEAKER_00: the reflection in the water shows him the sky but also shows him himself but
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  SPEAKER_00: when he sees himself he also is reminded of god of things divine and
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  SPEAKER_00: me myself in the summer heaven godlike looking down and wreathed in clouds
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  SPEAKER_00: but there are so many difficulties so many barriers to perceiving whatever the truth
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  SPEAKER_00: at the heart of things is the water is deep and dark and the very act of him leaning
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  SPEAKER_00: over to gaze down into the water blocks off much of the light
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  SPEAKER_00: that would be necessary to see what's down there
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  SPEAKER_00: This is the possibility and anxiety maybe of being an artist, but also
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  SPEAKER_00: any kind of human inquiry into the transcendent. Just like trying to look at the sun,
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  SPEAKER_00: any effort to look directly at it immediately frustrates your ability to perceive clearly
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  SPEAKER_00: the thing that you're trying to Look At. And when you want to write it down, crystallize
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  SPEAKER_00: it put it into any kind of art.
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  SPEAKER_00: the difficulties are compounded and so it's a kind of sad poem there is both
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  SPEAKER_00: a looking up toward what is beyond the normal experience of life but also
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  SPEAKER_00: a looking inward and this
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  SPEAKER_00: frustration this instinct that something is there that can't be gotten
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  SPEAKER_00: at this yearning for something to be there a wish for something
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  SPEAKER_00: to be there you feel this in the final words for once then something is
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  SPEAKER_00: even if the speaker can't clearly discern what it is the notion
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  SPEAKER_00: that something is there is a relief but even then it's frustrating or sad because
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  SPEAKER_00: so many
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  SPEAKER_00: of these inquiries he suggests he intimates have turned up no satisfying results he
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  SPEAKER_00: has looked and looked and found nothing but now this time
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  SPEAKER_00: for once something he's not even sure that it's the truth but it could be
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  SPEAKER_00: and there does seem to be a final note in the midst of the sadness a final note
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  SPEAKER_00: of hope in that here's the poem one more time others taunt me with having knelt
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  SPEAKER_00: at well curbs always wrong to the light so never seeing deeper down in the well than
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  SPEAKER_00: where the water gives me back in a shining surface picture me myself in
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  SPEAKER_00: the summer heaven godlike looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs
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  SPEAKER_00: once trying with chin against a well curb i discerned as i thought beyond
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  SPEAKER_00: the picture through the picture a something white uncertain something more of
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  SPEAKER_00: the depths and then i lost it water came to rebuke the too clear water one drop fell
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  SPEAKER_00: from a fern and low a ripple shook whatever it was lay there
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  SPEAKER_00: at bottom blurred it blotted it out what was that whiteness truth
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  SPEAKER_00: a pebble of quartz for once then something
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  SPEAKER_00: this has been the daily poem thanks
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  SPEAKER_00: for listening we'll be back tomorrow with more poetry for you till then find us
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  SPEAKER_00: at dailypoempod.substack.com to listen to past episodes or become a subscriber
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  SPEAKER_00: and supporter of the show for all of us
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  SPEAKER_00: at goldberry studios i'm sean johnson wishing you happy reading