Robert Frost’s “Road Not Taken” is a commonly-taught poem that’s commonly misunderstood. Ideally, the brief detour into an American classic can allow for a better understanding of the Vikings predictions discussed further on.
The unnamed speaker of the poem credits his haphazard decision to opt for one path over the other as the move “that has made all the difference.” The issue, though, simply rests in the speaker’s earlier admission that the pair of paths are “just as fair” while similarly acknowledging they’re “really about the same.”
The immediate contradictions — insisting he “kept the first for another day!