The metaphors of the forces of nature, create the opening ideas of the the woman's self-assurance, self-reliance, and self-respect. Robert Frost opens, "The Silken Tent," with the line, "she is as in a field a silken tent," and immediately creates an image of plain, and simple beauty (Frost 1). People, and especially women, given culture's emphasis on female beauty, can be seen like a silk tent, lovely, precious, expensive to maintain, vulnerable. However, the vision is of a tent, as more than just a bleak view of beauty. Although the tent may look plainly beautiful in a field at midday, the tent is also standing firm against the summer sun, supported by a strong, "central cedar pole" (Frost 4). The tent is not only the plain beauty on the outside, but the inner support which keeps the tent upright. Similar to how a woman has skin and flesh on the outside, that may be beautiful, it is only her inner soul that keeps her strong, not her beauty. Since she has her inner support, she is further described as in the direction of, "pinnacle to heavenward" (Frost 6), and makes her seem almost angelic. Her unity and wholeness of her soul becomes God-like. This Godly aura, "signifies the sureness of her soul" (Frost 7). Her soul is capable of being heavenly, because she has the strong inner support. This lets her confidence to radiate. The speaker describes her as perfectly content with her soul. Even though the speaker is describing her as an almost perfect woman.
We see her develop further as she, "seems to owe not to any single cord." She is not reliant or connected to a single rope or cord but rather, the woman tent seems to connect to everything like that of Mother Nature. The connections are made with, "countless silken ties of love and thought," signifying the woman's deep care and compassion. "She," as the poet says, is like the silken tent.