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Why make so much of fragmentary blue In here and there a bird, or butterfly, Or flower, or wearing-stone, or open eye, When heaven presents in sheets the solid hue?
Robert Frost
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Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote reflects on the beauty found in small, fleeting moments within the greater context of nature.

Robert Frost's quote invites us to appreciate the delicate and transient elements of nature, such as birds, butterflies, and flowers, which exist alongside the vast and solid blue of the sky. It suggests that while the overwhelming beauty of nature can be grand and constant, it is often the small, fragmentary instances of beauty that truly enrich our experience of the natural world.

Themes

NatureBeautyAppreciationTransienceObservation

In practice

Example use cases

During a nature walk, one might use this quote to encourage others to slow down and see the small wonders around them.

More from Robert Frost

Two such as you with such a master speed, cannot be parted nor be swept away, from one another once you are agreed, that life is only life forevermore, together wing to wing and oar to oar.
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You have freedom when you're easy in your harness.
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God made a beauteous garden With lovely flowers strown, But one straight, narrow pathway That was not overgrown. And to this beauteous garden He brought mankind to live, And said "To you, my children, These lovely flowers I give. Prune ye my vines and fig trees, With care my flowers tend, But keep the pathway open Your home is at the end." God's Garden
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'Warm in December, cold in June, you say?' _x000D_ _x000D_ I don't suppose the water's changed at all. _x000D_ _x000D_ You and I know enough to know it's warm _x000D_ _x000D_ Compared with cold, and cold compared with warm. _x000D_ _x000D_ But all the fun's in how you say a thing.
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For, dear me, why abandon a belief, Merely because it ceases to be true, Cling to it long enough, and not a doubt, It will turn true again, for so it goes.
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The question that he frames in all but words is what to make of a diminished thing.
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