August 14 - A Poem by Robert Frost

The Investment
by Robert Frost

Over back where they speak of life as staying
('You couldn't call it living, for it ain't'),
There was an old, old house renewed with paint,
And in it a piano loudly playing.

Out in the plowed ground in the cold a digger,
Among unearthed potatoes standing still,
Was counting winter dinners, one a hill,
With half an ear to the piano's vigor.

All that piano and new paint back there,
Was it some money suddenly come into?
Or some extravagance young love had been to?
Or old love on an impulse not to care--

Not to sink under being man and wife,
But get some color and music out of life?

Well, friends, is the house-painting piano playing couple in this poem the best example of foolhardiness and waste? Or do they represent a spirit that will never, never quit.

Never surrender.

Grace and peace,
Trav Wilson