Quote Response

From W.H. Auden's "As I Walked Out One Evening"

"You shall love your crooked neighbor with your crooked heart" (757).

I chose this quote not for its meaning within the poem or even because I fully understand what the author was intending the quote to mean. It stood out to me because of the wording and what I understood it to mean in life in general. Crooked to me can mean one of two things; twisty and imperfect or malicious and bad-natured. I took this quote to mean that we are all sort of crooked in that we all have flaws and imperfections and because we share that quality with every single other person in this world, we should love one another.

It is not often that a person can say that they have something in common with every other person, in fact, when people think of similarities they tend to think of hobbies, interests, goals, etc. We don't think of that which makes us human and unique; our flaws and overall crooked way of life. There is something quirky or different about all of us, and for the whole world to have something in common is pretty profound and deserves recognition.

Again, this may or may not have a single thing to do with the meaning of the poem, but this particular quote I think goes far beyond just this poem and has meaning to all aspects of life.