"Nothing Gold Can Stay" by Robert Frost has more than one meaning. It can literally be discussing nature. It is also about the innocence of a childhood and how it can be lost.
Innocence is part of being a child. So, childhood's first description is of being innocent. "Nature's first green is gold- (1) means that life's first feature is innocence.
Innocence is hard to hold onto. There are many ways to lose innocence. A simple white lie signals the lose of innocence. "Her hardest hue to hold" (2) says how hard it is to hold onto something so precious. Not only is it hard to hold onto innocence but it is also hard to hold onto the beautiful colors of nature. In the spring, nature's colors are beautiful but once winter comes, the colors fades. This is much like the innocence of a child.
Life starts out with innocence. It continues until the innocence is lost. A flower is just like a child. The beautiful, radiant colors of when it first blooms in the spring are the flower's innocence. Spring only lasts a few months and when the colder weather comes, the vibrant colors fade and the flower dies. At the beginning of life, a child is so innocent and new to the world. As time passes by and the child grows up, the innocence fades with a lie or a fight. Innocence cannot stay for long.
Innocence only lasts so long. The line "But only so an hour" (4) means that innocence has a short lifespan. Innocence dies like the beauty of a flower. It only lasts for a little while. It cannot stay for long because there is so much that can take it away.
The loss of innocence is terrible and can be hard to deal with. Sometimes people must grieve over the loss of innocence and how big of a change it becomes. "So Eden .
Brogden 3.
sank to grief" (6) is the line that describes the feeling of losing innocence and going through that big of a change. However, innocence, like everything else, cannot last forever.
Looking at the poem in a broader way, the reader realizes that it means that nothing can last forever.
