Oncebythepacific

Inside “Once by the Pacific”
Once by the Pacific”, by Robert Frost is a very forceful poem. The most popular interpretation of this poem is destruction. The theme of the poem is that what once wasthe beginning, could turn into the end. The literary elements of personification, diction and allusion help support this theme.
Robert Frost uses personification to support the theme of his poem;"Once by the Pacific". A personification is a comparison made by providing human characteristics to a nonhuman object. With the use of this literary element, Frost is able to compare the power ofnature with human actions. An example of how he uses personification is found in line 2:”Great waves looked over others coming in”. In this line, waves are attributed the human characteristic of looking.This personification helps the reader understand the immensity of the waves that were to come; each of them greater than the other. Frost also uses diction in the poem to convey the theme to thereader.
Diction or word choice is also an important literary element in the poem. The word choice is essential in this poem because it influences the images the reader gets of the poem and the way hewill interpret the theme. One of the main ways in which Frost uses diction is to provoke strong thoughts and images that help the reader infer about what will happen next in the poem. An example ofdiction in the poem is in line 4: “that water never did to land before”. In this line Frost does not use any strong or intense words, however the order he puts the words in, create a powerful phrase. Theword choice in this line helps the reader infer that something catastrophic is about to happen next, something that has never happened before. Frost also uses an allusion to deliver the theme to thereader.
The last stanza is probably the deepest line in the poem. In it, diction supports an allusion to create a greater impact on the reader. In the last line the speaker says; “Before Gods last...