Fire And Ice by Robert Frost

Considering the title I expect the poem may be about contrasts.

Considering the lay-out the poem is organised into free lines. It is arranged into two couplets and five lines. The first couplet is an alternate couplet and the second one is a rhyming couplet.

The speaking voice is in first person / There is a first person voice and it expresses two different points of view abot the end of the world. Some people think the world will end in fire and other people think it will end in ice.

The function of the first couplet is to express two different points of view about how the world will end. In the rhyming couplet the poet explain hs opinion and consideration. He also give us a reason of his opinion. Thanks to his experience the speaking voice's opinion is that the world will end burning. On a second thought the poet thinks if it had to die twice, he knows enough of hate to say that ice is also enough for world's distruction. The function of the five lines is to confirm that the world will end both in fire and in ice.

Lines' organisation is suitable to add meaning to the poem. Indeed / To tell the truth the choice of alternate line adds meaning to the two different opinions: on one hand (A) there are those who believes world will end in fire, on the other hand (B) there are those who believes / are convinced / thinks it will end in ice.

The poet plays with the assonance of sound “A” so that the two words, “fire and ice” are always recalled each other. Also there is the alliteration of sound “W” so that the word “world” becomes central in the first two lines. Also the verb “end” has got a stressed syllable and comes in key position.

The poet exploits an anaphoric syntaxt creating a phonological sound effect. The first line ends with a comma so that the reader's attention stops with the word “fire”. The second line focuses the reader's attention on the word “ice”.

All the literature devices present in the first two lines are meant to better put into focus the two different opinions about the end of the world.

The poem shows an argumentative structure: from his experience of having desire someone or something he believes the world will end burning.