"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."

“Before I built a wall I'd ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence. Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That wants it down.”

“My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, "Good fences make good neighbours."”

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.”

“"Men work together," I told him from the heart,"Whether they work together or apart."”

“There was never a sound beside the wood but one, And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.”

“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.”