"Fireflies in the Garden" by Robert Frost - Norton Literature

Robert Frost was an American playwright and poet, born on March 26, 1874 in California.  The portion of his life on a farm served as the inspiration for many of his poems, renowned and acclaimed many times over.  Before his death of prostate surgery complications, he had received four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry and the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions.




"Fireflies in the Garden" by Robert Frost


Here come real stars to fill the upper skies,
And here on earth come emulating flies,
That though they never equal the stars in size,
(And they were never really stars at heart)
Achieve at times a very star-like start.                      5
Only, of course, they cant sustain the part.
                                                                          [1928]

The entirety of this simple, six-versed poem is a metaphor, comparing the real stars and the fireflies that strive to imitate them.  Upon the arrival of night, the “real stars… fill the upper skies” along with their small, insignificant pretenders.  The poem describes the efforts of the fireflies to “Achieve a star-like start” in their attempt to emulate the stars, though, “of course, they can’t sustain the part.”  It is expected that Frost will pay respect to these microcosms of stars after the first two lines, but, after he uses strong diction to assure the readers that they were “never equal stars in size” and “never really stars at heart,” Frost conveys an entirely different tone.  As opposed to appreciation or contentment, this diction creates a tone of disdain or even contempt for the flies, and the announcement of their phoniness and role as a charlatan is filled with condescension.  Utilizing this tone, Frost seems to provide a commentary on the use of symbols themselves through his metaphorical poem: just as the firefly can only imitate a star in a weak and unsubstantial way, a literary symbol can only catch a brief and ephemeral aspect of something more significant.  Symbols and metaphors used in literature possess only the ability catch bits and pieces of the feeling that the actual object exudes.  Given the cold and unappreciative tone of the poem, Frost seems almost bitter; bitter about his inability to truly describe through a symbol a feeling that an object evokes, or perhaps bitter at the poetic inadequacy of language as a whole, represented by the inability of the fireflies to attain stardom.