I Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long

I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. 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. II Natures first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leafs a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay. III One of my wishes is that those dark trees, So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze, Were not, as 'twere, the merest mask of gloom, But stretched away unto the edge of doom.

I should not be withheld but that some day Into their vastness I should steal away, Fearless of ever finding open land, Or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand. I do not see why I should e'er turn back, Or those should not set forth upon my track To overtake me, who should miss me here And long to know if still I held them dear. They would not find me changed from him they knew-Only more sure of all I thought was true. IV 'Fred, where is north?' 'North? North is there, my love. The brook runs west.' 'West-running Brook then call it.' (West-Running Brook men call it to this day.) 'What does it think k's doing running west When all the other country brooks flow east To reach the ocean? It must be the brook Can trust itself to go by contraries The way I can with you -- and you with me -Because we're -- we're -- I don't know what we are. What are we?' 'Young or new?' 'We must be something. We've said we two. Let's change that to we three. As you and I are married to each other, We'll both be married to the brook. We'll build Our bridge across it, and the bridge shall be Our arm thrown over it asleep beside it. Look, look, it's waving to us with a wave To let us know it hears me.' ' 'Why, my dear, That wave's been standing off this jut of shore --' (The black stream, catching a sunken rock,

Flung backward on itself in one white wave, And the white water rode the black forever, Not gaining but not losing, like a bird White feathers from the struggle of whose breast Flecked the dark stream and flecked the darker pool Below the point, and were at last driven wrinkled In a white scarf against the far shore alders.) 'That wave's been standing off this jut of shore Ever since rivers, I was going to say,' Were made in heaven. It wasn't waved to us.' 'It wasn't, yet it was. If not to you It was to me -- in an annunciation.' 'Oh, if you take it off to lady-land, As't were the country of the Amazons We men must see you to the confines of And leave you there, ourselves forbid to enter,It is your brook! I have no more to say.' 'Yes, you have, too. Go on. You thought of something.' 'Speaking of contraries, see how the brook In that white wave runs counter to itself. It is from that in water we were from Long, long before we were from any creature. Here we, in our impatience of the steps, Get back to the beginning of beginnings, The stream of everything that runs away. Some say existence like a Pirouot And Pirouette, forever in one place, Stands still and dances, but it runs away, It seriously, sadly, runs away To fill the abyss' void with emptiness. It flows beside us in this water brook, But it flows over us. It flows between us To separate us for a panic moment. It flows between us, over us, and with us. And it is time, strength, tone, light, life and loveAnd even substance lapsing unsubstantial; The universal cataract of death That spends to nothingness -- and unresisted, Save by some strange resistance in itself,

Not just a swerving, but a throwing back, As if regret were in it and were sacred. It has this throwing backward on itself So that the fall of most of it is always Raising a little, sending up a little. Our life runs down in sending up the clock. The brook runs down in sending up our life. The sun runs down in sending up the brook. And there is something sending up the sun. It is this backward motion toward the source, Against the stream, that most we see ourselves in, The tribute of the current to the source. It is from this in nature we are from. It is most us.' 'To-day will be the day....You said so.' 'No, to-day will be the day You said the brook was called West-running Brook.' 'To-day will be the day of what we both said.' V I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light. I have looked down the saddest city lane. I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain. I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry Came over houses from another street, But not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height One luminary clock against the sky Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right. I have been one acquainted with the night. VI They cannot scare me with their empty spaces Between stars on stars where no human race is. I have it in me so much nearer home

To scare myself with my own desert places. VII Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what Ive tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. and some quotes Most of the change we see in life is due to truths being in and out of favor. A diplomat is a man who always remembers a womans birthday, but never remembers her age. Forgive, O Lord, my little jokes on Thee And Ill forgive Thy great big one on me. The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office. I never dared be radical when young, for fear it would make me conservative when old. Dont be agnostic. Be something. A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer. A liberal is a man too broad-minded to take his own side in a quarrel. Freedom lies in being bold. In three words I can sum up everything that I have learned about life. It goes on.