In plain, urgent words, Carl Sandburg asks that love be spent completely—poured out until the answers run out, the money is gone, the blood is gone. The speaker feels time as a quiet, violent winner: it carries an ax and a hammer, slips through locked doors, and outruns every clock. Yet the poem is not simply bleak. The repeated line “Let love go on” sounds like both a plea and a dare. Love is measured in heartbeats, finite and ready to gamble with, so the speaker wants it clean, whole, and given fully while it lasts. The mood is tender and defiant—a love poem aware of death, urging us to keep loving exactly because time wins in the end.
Let Love Go On — Summary
Let it go on; let the love of this hour be poured out till all the answers are made, the last dollar spent and the last blood gone. Time runs with an ax and a hammer, time slides down the hallways with a pass-key and a master-key, and time gets by, time wins. Let the love of this hour go on ; let all the oaths and children and people of this love be clean as a washed stone under a waterfall in the sun. Time is a young man with ballplayer legs, time runs a winning race against life and the clocks, time tickles with rust and spots. Let love go on ; the heartbeats are measured out with a measuring glass, so many apiece to gamble with, to use and spend and reckon ; let love go on.