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Thank God for Robert Frost

November 10, 2015
Civility Message

Dear Friends,

My English teacher, Ms. Alma Holland, introduced me to Robert Frost when I was a 10th grader at Booker T. Washington High School in Wichita Falls, Texas. My assignment one week was to memorize the great poem, “The Road Not Taken.” Even today, I still believe that it is not only beautiful, but sermonic as well. I credit Robert Frost, through Ms. Holland, for inspiring me to discover the magic of words.

Robert Frost has actually aided me in dealing with the frustration of serving in Congress at a time when gridlock seems to be the order of the day. Sometimes, I become so baffled by the Democratic/Republican fights that I mentally curse and quit. Yet, I've become an intuitionalist. In fact, I've grown to enjoy even the most common traditions, this debate, the pomposity of a joint session, and the ceremoniousness of each morning of the bringing the House to order.

Thank God for Robert Frost. In his 1941 poem, “I had a Lover's Quarrel with the World,” he taught me that it was possible to love even in the thick of discord and disputation. Love is the key word. It becomes the parachute to prevent a hard, damaging fall.

If it sounds as if I desperately need something to help with my despair, I do. Simply put, I need love. I love the House but I am fussy about its rocking chair system of government — a system that creates a lot of motion but sometimes doesn't get us anywhere. Especially when I consider the needs of my constituents that go unmet as some of my colleagues in Washington put battle before breakthrough.

I have a lover's quarrel with the House. I do.

Robert L. Frost died in 1963 and the epitaph on his grave stone in Bennington, Vermont reads, Robert L. Frost, 1874-1963, "I had a lover's quarrel with the world." I hope a similar wording can be earned for my gravesite.

Image removed.

Emanuel Cleaver, II
Member of Congress

Issues:Civility