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Gerber, “The first comes with an obtrusive gesture in the poem’s second line; it’s seemingly gratuitous reference to the ladder’s pointing “toward heaven still”. Without straining the issue, the word heaven elicits subconscious responses involving death and immortality.” (Charters 1160). Frost also looks back on his life wondering if he made the right choices. “…Beside it, and there might be two or three/ apples I didn’t pick upon some bough…” (Charters 1011) is a representation of that thought. In addition, this metaphor illustrates that throughout his life he wasn’t able to do everything as planned. Moreover, another example of orientational metaphor from “After Apple Picking” is going back down to earth. “… I got from looking through a pane of glass/ And held against the world of hoary grass/ It melted, and I let it fall and break…” (Charters 1011 -1012) is a part of the poem where Frost gives an entirely different meaning to a concept. In these lines, he gives a personal perspective of how he is willing to accept the direction of his life. When he refers to letting the window of glass”fall and break”, he is really talking about ice that has melted. In “Toward Robert Frost”, Oster explains “Ice carries further the idea of “winter sleep” and suggests, therefore, age, death or at least a temporary death of nature. It is also more fragile and transitory than glass.” (Oster 239). His metaphor of falling down and breaking represents a weary feeling about death. Another line that signifies a form of metaphor is “… There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch/Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall/ For all/ That struck the earth…” (Charters 1012). When he mentions thousands of fruit he is really referring to all the opportunities that came his way that he shouldn’t have let go of but did and at this point he regrets it. There is a noticeable change in his feelings. In the beginning of the poem Frost has a sense of satisfaction and believes there is a place for him in heaven when he describes the direction of the ladder. At this point, he is now frustrated and regretful because of unfulfilled parts of his life, then displaying orientational metaphor of coming back down to earth to show such dissatisfaction. Lastly is the line that closes up the poem of “After Apple Picking.” “… The woodchuck could say whether it’s like his/Long sleep, as I describe its coming on, / Or just some human sleep.” Frost uses the metaphor of a woodchuck’s “long sleep” in terms of hibernation. In human terms, “long sleep” comes into relation with death, he then says,”Or just some human sleep” meaning the normal cycle of sleeping and then waking up to start a new day. He wonders if sleep will be left for him after apple picking but really meaning death. “Birches”, another metaphorical poem by Frost, displays a significant amount of orientational metaphors. According to Judith Oster, in “Birches” we are not given just a picture/images of trees, we are being given “… a powerful, dynamic drama of climbing birches, of a boy testing the limits of his daring, keeping his balance in a precarious positions of his own choosing. Too far from town to play baseball, too alone to be challenged by others, he challenges himself.” (Faggen 160) Along with the description of this boy, within the poem there also comes a combination of memories, imagination and a bit of reality. Within the first few lines, Frost depicts imagination when he explains that in his mind he likes to believe that a boy has bent the birches. Reality then kicks in immediately after the thought when he comes to a realization that only ice storms can bend them down. A metaphor that Frost uses to compare the birches “… Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair/ Before them over their heads to dry in the sun...”