In the last stanza of “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost published in 1916 as part of the poetry collection Mountain Interval, the narrator of the poem states the following:
“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.”
The sigh, often related to feelings of exasperation, wistfulness, regret, sorrow, and/or longing, is signaling the emotional state of the narrator who is desiring to follow both paths at the fork in the road described in the poem. At the first reading, she is imagining her future self; lamenting the missed opportunity of the road she did not take. A second reading uncovers the possibility that the sigh signals that the path “less traveled by” led to a much more fulfilling life for the narrator. The poet’s use of the sigh leaves much of the decision to the reader as to how the narrator felt.
The nature of life entails that we do not get to make the same decision twice and that most people understand the concept of missed opportunities. A poem that resonates with the experience of many readers and allows the reader to “see” themselves in this position uses terms and phrases that allow for a certain ambiguity which invites the reader to fill in the meaning that makes the most sense. The sigh in this poem is such a device which leaves open the possible interpretation of the moment. Seeing the sigh as a positive or negative can be supported by the other lines of the poem and relies mostly on the life experience and perspective of the reader.
Regardless of the reader’s interpretation, Frost has created a moment where we know that this moment in his life, where he had to choose a path, was both profound and emotional. He will remember it “ages and ages hence” and it will provoke the emotional response of a sigh at each retelling.
More information about the psychology of the sigh can be found at https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brain-babble/201304/why-do-we-sigh.
The sigh you refer to comes at the end of one of Frost's most famous poems, "The Road Not Taken." The speaker in this poem says that "ages and ages hence," he will be telling people "with a sigh" about the point describes in the poem, when two roads appeared before him and he was forced to select one of them.
We sigh for many reasons, but primarily a sigh signifies regret or reflection. The speaker chose the road which appeared best to him at the time. He could not see, at the time, any particular difference between the two paths, but this is all the more reason why he was "sorry" he "could not travel both." This being the case, he has thought for long years about that choice and wondered what difference it might have made in his life if he had taken the other path. Because he can never know how different his life might have been if he had made the other choice, out of two seemingly very similar choices, his mind has returned over and over to that moment, reflecting and reliving it. This is why he might "sigh" when recounting the story to others: it is exhausting to interrogate one's own life in such a fashion, when the answers to our questions can never be known. And yet, the speaker cannot stop himself from wondering.
Ultimately, however, the speaker has not lived a life of regret. He has resolved that it has "made all the difference" that he chose the road he took, and while he may still sigh over having been forced to choose one road, rather than traveling both, the tone of the poem is not one of a man who regrets his choice.
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