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About this quote

What does it mean?
The poem describes warming a frozen swamp by the slow, smokeless burning of decay, suggesting renewal through gradual change.
In plain terms
Decay slowly warms the cold swamp.
What can you take from it?
Small, patient processes can revive stagnant situations.

Where it applies

  • environmental recovery
  • personal healing

Putting it to work

  • allow time for change
  • embrace gradual improvement

Questions to consider

  • What slow processes have helped you recover?
  • Can decay ever be positive?

Another view

The image of decay as warming may seem contradictory.

More from Robert Frost

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

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  2. My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree Toward heaven still. And there's a barrel that I didn't fill Beside it, and there may be two or three Appl…

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  3. But he sent her Good-by, And said to be good, And wear her red hood, And look for skunk tracks In the snow with an ax - And do everything!

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