Robert Frost wrote it. I always remembered it because I never quite knew what he meant.

In honor of his birthday (1874-1963), a Robert Frost poem.

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.