New York City is one of the most urban settings in the world. But what if I told you that between the honking yellow cabs and towering skyscrapers, nature hides in plain sight? Robert Frost, born in San Francisco in the spring of 1874, moved cross-country to New England at the age of 11. While he spent some time in England in his early adulthood, he moved back to the East Coast, and most of his work is based on the landscape of the more rural areas of New Hampshire and Massachusetts. While one may think that Manhattan is no place to draw comparisons between Frost’s poetry and its hard, cement exterior, I find the opposite to be true. I’ve compiled a list of some of my favorite Frost poetry and included with each, a location in Manhattan which I find embodies the spirit of each work. I’ve left interpretation to the reader, because I suggest that you visit these places, read these poems while you’re there, and feel what Frost felt as he was in his cottage, surrounded by trees and wildlife. I don’t want to spoil the feelings for you by telling you why I find that they correlate, but I feel that if you experience it for yourself, you can draw your own conclusions. Bring your favorite book, or some of your own favorite poetry while you’re visiting these locations. Nature is an excellent place to lose yourself in literature, and there’s plenty of places in the city that you can do so!
My November Guest – Hallett Nature Sanctuary
My Sorrow, when she’s here with me,
Thinks these dark days of autumn rain
Are beautiful as days can be;
She loves the bare, the withered tree;
She walked the sodden pasture lane.
Her pleasure will not let me stay.
She talks and I am fain to list:
She’s glad the birds are gone away,
She’s glad her simple worsted gray
Is silver now with clinging mist.
The desolate, deserted trees,
The faded earth, the heavy sky,
The beauties she so truly sees,
She thinks I have no eye for these,
And vexes me for reason why.
Not yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November days
Before the coming of the snow,
But it were vain to tell her so,
And they are better for her praise.
Robert Frost (A Boy’s Will, 1915)
If you’re walking in Central Park South, pass the pond at 5th Avenue and continue to travel north, you’ll come across the Hallett Nature Sanctuary. It was first created as a bird sanctuary in the 30s and was revamped in the 80’s. I came across it by accident while on a stroll through the park with my boyfriend, and while we were having an animated conversation on the walk outside of it, we were both wordless and amazed at the seclusion and “woodsiness” of it. Something so close to Rollman Rink and the Plaza Hotel, nestled in the upper east side of Manhattan, looked like something right from our home state of Massachusetts.
Nothing Gold Can Stay – Elizabeth Street Garden
Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay.
Robert Frost (The Yale Review / New Hampshire, 1923)
After its birth as a public school and playground in 1903, the Elizabeth Street Garden was born in the 90s and now faces a fate of being taken away from the community. Another place I stumbled across, this time on a dog walk, it is, in my humble opinion, one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen in Manhattan. A mixture of foliage and unique sculptures make up the landscape of this garden, but non-profit workers have been seeing to it that an apartment complex won’t crush this beautiful piece of history. To donate to their legal defense fund or sign the petition, go to elizabethstreetgarden.com, or go to the garden in person!
Fire and Ice – Roosevelt Island Smallpox Hospital
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
Robert Frost (Harper’s Magazine, 1920 / New Hampshire, 1923)
Roosevelt Island’s convenient isolation allowed for victims of Smallpox to be separated from rest of the general population of NYC in 1854, when it was then known as Riverside Hospital, or Renwick’s Smallpox Hospital, after the architect of the project, James Renwick Jr, who also designed St. Patrick’s Cathedral on 5th Avenue and the Smithsonian in D.C. After an almost 20 year run, it was converted to a maternity nurse training facility, and southern and northern structures were added to accompany the need for more space. In the mid 20th century, it was abandoned and left to become “The Ruins of the Roosevelt Island Smallpox Hospital,” and in the 1970s and 80s, it was declared a historic landmark, although already in a state of disrepair. While moves have been made to restore the building, winter storms continue to make the shell of the building more dangerous. Staging has been put in place to keep the structure up, and a fence runs around the perimeter to deter tourists from entering the, no doubt dangerous, structure. What stands today is a beautiful, nature-inhabited, overgrown, gothic piece of art, which I believe lives as a notion of nature taking back a small part of the city.
Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening – Shakespeare Garden, Central Park
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
Robert Frost (New Hampshire, 1923)
Why have I found so many of these locations by accident? I guess that just goes to show that by going for a walk in the city, you can find so many beautiful Easter eggs. I found this space while on a walk the day after arriving back in the city from spring break. I had never explored the area around Turtle Pond before, as whenever I was near the Metropolitan Museum of Art, – I was inside the museum, not exploring the area behind it. When I rounded the corner and saw the wooden, rustic style benches with flowers blooming in early April behind it, I actually gasped. It’s clear why it’s one of the top proposal and wedding locations in NYC – it’s breathtaking.
Stars – Pier 54
How countlessly they congregate O’er our tumultuous snow, Which flows in shapes as tall as trees When wintry winds do blow!—
As if with keenness for our fate, Out faltering few steps on To white rest, and a place of rest Invisible at dawn,—
And yet with neither love nor hate, Those stars like some snow-white Minerva’s snow-white marble eyes Without the gift of sight.
Robert Frost (A Boy’s Will, 1915)
Pier 54 has quite the eerie past. Just a few years before A Boy’s Will was published, a large passenger ship sank in the North Atlantic. In the cold, early April air in 1912, the survivors of the wreck of the Titanic arrived at Pier 54 on the Carpathia. While the building itself fell victim to a fire in the 1930s, what is left is a ghostly iron gate stationed against the Hudson. What I tend to forget a lot is that Manhattan is an island. I don’t know why I forget that, but it doesn’t feel like this empire could be floating in the water (I know that’s not how islands work, it’s an expression.) Standing at the shell of what was once an entrance to a new world for thousands of people, looking out towards the water, the feeling is quite inexplicable.
Lodged – The Gardens at Saint Luke’s
The rain to the wind said,
‘You push and I’ll pelt.’
They so smote the garden bed
That the flowers actually knelt,
And lay lodged–though not dead.
I know how the flowers felt.
Robert Frost (West-Running Brook, 1928)
The Church of Saint Luke in the Fields has a rich history, beginning on Hudson Street in the 1820s – 100 years before Robert Frost even wrote West-Running Brook. Nearly 200 years old, the church itself has seen yellow fever and the HIV/AIDS epidemics. In the 1980s, the church fell victim to a fire, but by 1985, after outreach from the neighborhood and congregation, it was restored and prevailed. The gardens are one of the most perfectly manicured landscapes I’ve ever seen in the city. The grounds are kept so perfect, the moment you walk in, you almost want to hold your breath, lest you disturb anything. The gardens at Saint Luke’s are a stunning example of how nature and humans can cohabitate in the most perfect way. While I’m not a religious person, the church has stunning outreach programs for homeless LGBTQ youth, ensuring children get a well-rounded education and art programs for members of every age. Even if you aren’t a churchgoer, you will be easily stunned at how inclusive and positive the atmosphere of the congregation is. Stop into the thrift shop to help these lovely humans continue their work, or visit stlukeinthefields.org to learn more.
Of course, these aren’t the only places in the city you can find spurts of nature in, and Robert Frost has so many amazing poems! These poems and places are extremely near and dear to my heart, and I hope you find the symbolism in each pair as I have!