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| “You don’t have to read Robert Frost to know. You have to live life to know that the difficult path is usually the one less traveled, but it will make all the difference for the future of my country, the security of the Middle East and the peace of the world, the peace, we all desire.” --Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the United States Congress, March 3, 2015 |
after Robert Frost
Two roads diverged on a snowy morning
on Congress' floor. The travelers could not
journey together along each path, one trodden
with storm of angst & warrior remains.
The other looked about the same, but hope
was sprinkled along the edges of the trail,
& sunlight could be seen streaming through
the fabric of oak & pine & fir. The travelers
listened to the vibes of each path, cupped
seasoned hands to ears to hear the trials
of trees, the brag of wind, the bend of earth.
Now some preferred the leitmotif that emerged
from one––a lighter tune they heard, say
a Mozart flute. They chose that road, skipped
stones into a mountain lake, while Spanish
broom stretched yellow necks toward
rain-swept sky. And two hummingbirds
tangoed overhead as if to say: "You've taken
this road, & it will make all the difference."
Judith Terzi is a poet and educator living in Southern California. She is the author of Sharing Tabouli, Ghazal for a Chambermaid, and most recently, If You Spot Your Brother Floating By (Kattywompus). Her poems appear widely in online and print journals and are included in anthologies such as Forgetting Home: Poems about Alzheimer's (Barefoot Muse), Times They Were A-Changing: Women Remember the 60s & 70s (She Writes), and Wide Awake: The Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond (Beyond Baroque).