Introduction:
�Design� is a poem written by Robert Frost. It is a narration of a strange event witnessed by the poet and his internal musings that connect it to God.
About the Poet:
Robert Frost (1874-1963) was an eminent American poet. He was the recipient of many awards, including receiving the Pulitzer Prize four times. Famous works of his include �The Road Not Taken�, �Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening�, and �Fire and Ice�.�
Structure:
This poem is a Petrarchan sonnet, split into an octave containing 8 lines and a sestet containing 6 lines. It follows the rhyme scheme �abbaabba acaacc�.
Explanation of the Stanzas:
Octave:
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth-- Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right, Like the ingredients of a witches' broth-- A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth, And dead wings carried like a paper kite.
The poem begins with the poet�s persona� whom one can here construe to be the poet himself� finding a spider. He described this spider as �dimpled� and �fat and white�. He states that it was perched �On a white heal-all� flower and had within its grasp �a moth�. The poet states that the way the spider held the moth was like it held �a white piece of rigid satin cloth�. He then rather drily remarks that his morning had begun �right� with a mixture of such �Assorted characters of death and blight�. He proceeds to compare this mixture to the �ingredients of a witches� broth�. He ends this octave by once again highlighting the aforementioned �ingredients� � a �snow-drop spider�, a heal-all flower �like a froth�, and a moth whose �dead wings� were �carried like a paper kite� by the spider.
Sestet:
What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent heal-all? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night? What but design of darkness to appall?-- If design govern in a thing so small.
The sestet begins with the poet�s ruminations. He wonders why the heal-all flower here was �white� when it was supposed to be �wayside blue�. He wonders how the spider could have reached �that height� in the first place and what could have �steered� the moth that way �in the night�. He decides that this must have been some �design of darkness� conjured to �appall� anyone who chanced it� if such �designs� were even behind such trivial things.
Conclusion:
This is a deeply thought-provoking poem. It delves into how, as the age-old adage goes, indeed �God works in mysterious ways� � how even �a thing so small� in the world would be God�s doing, how the world functions because of the mysticism of God.