Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nothing Gold Can Stay

by Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf’s 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.

About the Poem

Robert Frost is one of those poets who can take just eight short lines and capture the weight of beauty, loss, and the passing of time. “Nothing Gold Can Stay” is deceptively simple—something you might read once and think you’ve understood—but the more you sit with it, the more layers it reveals.

At its heart, the poem reminds us that nothing beautiful lasts forever. The first flush of spring, the gold of new leaves, the brilliance of dawn—all are fleeting. Frost connects this natural cycle to the story of Eden, suggesting that even the purest moments of perfection can’t be held onto. Time moves forward, and everything inevitably changes.

I think this poem resonates so strongly because we’ve all had moments we wish we could freeze. Whether it’s the joy of youth, the fire of first love, or even a golden autumn day in Vermont, those moments are precious precisely because they’re fleeting. Frost doesn’t just mourn that loss—he honors it. By recognizing impermanence, we’re reminded to hold on a little tighter, to notice the beauty while it’s here.

It’s no wonder that this poem has found its way into popular culture too—most famously in S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders, where it becomes a message about innocence and holding on to what makes us shine before the world tries to wear it away.

For me, “Nothing Gold Can Stay” isn’t just about nature, or even about youth. It’s about the reminder that life itself is made of fleeting golden moments. We can’t keep them, but we can cherish them, and maybe that’s enough.

About the Poet

Robert Frost (1874–1963) is often remembered as one of America’s quintessential poets, though he spent nearly a decade in England before his work was first published. He returned to the U.S. just as his career was beginning to take off, and over the course of his life he became one of the most widely read and beloved poets of the 20th century.

Frost’s poetry is rooted in the landscapes and rhythms of rural New England. He wrote in plainspoken language, but beneath the simplicity lies a deep philosophical and emotional complexity. His poems often explore the tension between humanity and nature, the fleetingness of beauty, and the choices that shape our lives.

He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry four times, more than any other poet, and in 1961 he read at President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration. Despite his public persona as the homespun New England sage, Frost’s poetry frequently wrestles with darkness, loss, and impermanence—making “Nothing Gold Can Stay” a perfect example of his gift for distilling profound truth into the smallest of spaces.

For those of us in Vermont, Frost feels like a neighbor as well as a poet. He spent the last decades of his life here, teaching at Middlebury’s Bread Loaf School of English and writing in the Green Mountains he loved so well. He is buried in Bennington, Vermont, not far from where visitors can still walk the landscapes that inspired so much of his verse.