The following blog entry was written by Sarah Solomon, an intern here at READ.

Poetry can be read for pleasure, but have you ever heard of poetry being used as punishment?

25 partygoers in Middlebury, Vermont hadn't heard of that either until they were signed up for a mandatory poetry session as punishment for breaking into Robert Frost's house at the Homer Noble Farm. Breaking into a famous poets’ house is usually not a good idea.

A 17-year-old employee of Middlebury College thought it would be fun to hang out at Robert Frost's house, so he decided to throw a party. Over 50 people showed up, and by the end of the party there was broken china, broken windows, and a chair tossed in the fireplace. The total damage to the house was estimated at $10,600. That's a lot of money!

As punishment for those who wished to wipe their criminal records clean, two sessions of "Frost Instruction" were administered, each lead by Jay Parini, a professor at Middlebury College.

Parini used Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" to teach the students a lesson. Parini said that in this poem, the speaker is deciding between making one of two choices. Parini believes that this applies directly to the students' behavior – each must make a choice as to how they want to live his or her life.

The Road Not Taken
  - Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Actually, this poem is often misread. Most people believe this poem to be about making the right choices in life. However, Frost's underlying meaning is significantly different.

In fact, the speaker in the poem is relating to the listener that the choice he made just so happened to lead him to where he is now, and if he had taken the other path he probably wouldn't have ended up so differently. In the last stanza the speaker is implying that one day in the future when he is telling his story, he will try to teach a lesson and say that the certain path he took made all the difference, even though he might not believe it.

Click here to read the CNN article on the Homer Noble Farm break in.