Do not grudge your brother his rest. He has at last become free, safe and immortal, and ranges joyous through the boundless heavens; he has left this low-lying region and has soared upwards to that place which receives in its happy bosom the souls set free from the chains of matter. Your brother has not lost the light of day, but has obtained a more enduring light. He has not left us, but has gone on before.
If gods are supposed to be immortal and all knowing, and one who is immortal is one who never dies... how can they know it all and still choose to live?"
It is not for man to rest in absolute contentment. He is born to hopes and aspirations as the sparks fly upward, unless he has brutified his nature and quenched the spirit of immortality which is his portion.
Love is the only bow on life's dark cloud. It is the Morning and the Evening Star. It shines upon the cradle of the babe, and sheds its radiance upon the quiet tomb. It is the Mother of Art, inspirer of poet, patriot, and philosopher. It is the air and light of every heart, builder of every home, kindler of every fire on every hearth. It was the first dream of immortality. It fills the world with melody, for music is the voice of Love. Love is the magician, the enchanter, that changes worthless things to joy, and makes right royal kings of common clay. It is the perfume of the wondrous flower-the heart-and without that sacred passion, . . . we are less than beasts; but with it, earth and heaven are gods.
It is absurd to think that the only way to tell if a poem is lasting is to wait and see if it lasts. The right reader of a good poem can tell the moment it strikes him that he has taken an immortal wound-that he will never get over it.
Robert Frost
Source: The Poetry of Amy Lowell. >From the Christian Science Monitor, May 16, 1925
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