“Through the window I see no star:
Something more near
Though deeper within darkness
is entering the loneliness.”
Starting from line 6 is also the first indication of something else alive beside the poet in this silent night. The reader will soon discover that this animal is a fox in third stanza. At second stanza, we can see that as the thought fox is slowly unrevealed, the first idea that is going to fill the blank page is beginning to emerge. It is closer than the starless sky but it comes from a mysterious distance. The darkness plays the role of the poet’s mind, unexpected and mysterious, and the loneliness symbolizes the absence of right ideas or right words in his mind. As the “thought fox” is entering the loneliness, the poet’s mind is now filled with thought that will be necessary for writing a poem, hence the fox is the ideas or the thought. As we are reading this poem, we may gripped by the image of the fox because it is so graphic, the movement, appearance, and behavior of the fox are brilliantly described. However we have to be aware that what we are really seeing is the formation of words, poetry, in the speaker's mind; this is a metaphor for the writing process.
Before looking at depth in the literal sense of fox’s approach, notice that from line 5 to line 22 is constructed in a big sentence. Hughes writes this huge sentence, which stretched over four and a half stanza to describe the overall movement of the fox. The speaker is describing the fox's approach, which starts quietly then gathers momentum. The animal starts delicately, almost imperceptibly, but never stops. Then the speaker senses a shadow as the fox comes into a clearing. Then the eyes become clear and all of a sudden he arrives. The point is that once the fox starts to make his approach, he doesn't stop, hence the one long sentence.
From a literal view, the fox emerges slowly out of formlessness starting from stanza three.
“Cold, delicately as the dark snow,
a fox’s nose touches twig, leaf;”
The idea of the cold and dark snow reflects the physical reality of a fox’s nose, which is cold, dark, and damp, twitching against the twigs and leafs. This creates an image of the fox with its head down, and nose close to the ground. The fox nose touches the twigs and leaves as it tries to sense any traces of fragrance left behind on the ground, while moving toward us.
Follow by the appearance of the fox nose, the fox eyes gradually appear out of the same formlessness, leading the shadowy movement of its body as it comes closer.
“Two eyes serve a movement, that now
And again now, and now, and now
Sets neat prints into the snow
Between trees, and warily a lame
Of a body that is bold to come”
The first two lines of this phrase are deliberately broken by punctuation. This broken verse mimes the nervous, unpredictable movement of the fox as it steps forward, then stops to check on the terrain before it runs on. The tracks which the fox leaves onto the snow are themselves duplicated by the verse “sets neat prints on snow.” The first three words are internal rhyme, neat, identical and as sharp as the fox paw’s mark, pressing gently on to the soft open vowel of “snow.” Although the fox still remains indistinct, but the phrase “lame shadow” evokes a more precise image of the fox as the fox freezes with one its front paw lift up, as it stop alertly to explore the terrain. Once the fox starts running on again, its “Shadow lags by stump and in hollow”, revealing the great speed of the fox as it dashes through the forest.
After the fox dashes across the forest, it has finally come so close to the poet and the readers, that it has totally emerges out of the formlessness and reveal its true self.
“Across clearings, an eye,
A widening deepening greenness,
Brilliantly, concentratedly,
Coming about its own business”
The eyes of the fox are so concentrated that they merged into one single green glare, as it heads directly toward the poet and readers. Now the distance between the poet and the fox is essentially zero, allowing the poet to experience the “sudden sharp hot stink of fox” as the fox is “entering the dark hole of the (poet’s) head.”
Knowing solely the surface sense of this poem, which is the literal value of the fox, will never achieve the full understanding of this poem. Thus we have to look at this poem from a more in-depth perspective, the symbolic meaning of the fox. All the literal meaning of the fox which discussed earlier exists only in the internal world of the poet. This fox, which is a “thought fox”, symbolizes the thought or idea. With the fox delicate movements and actions, this can be seen as the thought process of the poet and how his inspiration or imagination comes about.
Before looking in depth to the symbolic meaning of the fox, an overall view on how the fox represents the thought process will be stated here. Stanza two is the first indication of something else is alive beside the poet, which is the thought fox. The first idea will be filled onto the blank page, since the fox symbolizes the poet ideas from brainstorming. In stanza three to five, the approach of the fox is thoroughly described. Looking it at metaphoric view, this fox will represents the words forming in the speaker's mind, words that he has been waiting for as part of the process of writing. This suggests that the speaker is going to start some writing on the blank page, but yet has no words. The last stanza describes the close encounter between the poet and the fox. Finally, the fox has revealed its true form, hence the poet now has the inspiration and words to complete his poem.
In stanza three, the “neat prints” on the snow are actually a pun, and also refer to the words being printed neatly by the writer on the blank page. The repetition of the word “now” in 12 shows that the paw marks are being printed down on the snow again and again as the fox dashes through the forest. This also refers to rate of the brainstorming process. The start is very delicate and slow, then the speed and certainty gradually builds up, as more and more paw marks are being printed on to the snow. The repetition of “now” also emphasizes the mechanical nature of writing, and the rhymes builds up a sense of excitement as the writer achieves his purpose.
In line 14 and 15, there is indications of the words has begun to flow but the image of the fox is still unclear, thus the page is still blanked. The fox is described indirectly as the “lame shadow”. The fox shape begin to emerge as the poem goes on, with the description of the fox’s eyes.
“Across clearings, an eye,
A widening, deepening greenness,
Brilliantly, concentratedly
Coming about its own business”
This stanza also shows that the poet is so concentrated on brainstorming that no external factors will have an effect on his thought process, which is stated “Coming about its own business” However, there is also one another meaning for the phrase “Coming about its own business”, suggesting that the writer still not entirely in conscious of what’s the right idea or words, since that the fox is not fully revealed yet, and its on his “own business”.
Now, before the fox is about to appear, the poet is able to see more details in his mind. Before the close encounter of Hughes and the fox, we are told of its heat and its smell, which can only sensed in a close distance.
“With a sudden sharp hot stink of fox
It enters the dark hole of the head.”
Notice that there are no punctuations in these both lines, suggesting that the fox or the inspiration has entered the poet’s mind swiftly and successfully. Now that the fox is no longer a mysterious image for the poet and it has emerge into the poet’s head. The “dark hole” in line 22 represents the poet’s head, the thought’s home. The thought fox has returned to its thought home, and now it is caught forever on the page. The speaker returns to his physical settings where the “window is starless still; the clock ticks” and a page that is no longer blanked, but now printed with words
The thought fox is a successful poem in both literal and symbolic level. On the surface level, the literal level, the image of fox is so thoroughly describes that it will certainly evokes a mental picture of fox in the readers minds. Moving in to the depth, the symbolic level, the poem has proved to be more attractive with the perfectly created movements of the fox which symbolize the different state of thought process. The poem has demonstrates a strong establishment in both literal and symbolic value. From these both level, we can conclude that the process of writing is almost unconscious. Words form themselves and take place gradually until they become absolutely clear. The act of creativity will then becomes a satisfying conclusion.