Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,
some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire,
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
to say that, for destruction, ice
is also great
and would suffice.
~Fire and Ice- Robert Frost

After reading this poem over and over, trying to understand it's meaning and in effect seeing it's intense relation to my own feelings, I have developed a rather complex opinion of it. It may be completely off base with what Frost's intentions were, but great poetry is all in how you interpret it, right? So here goes:
I think that Frost's intentions for this poem were to develop and warn against the deadly potential of human emotion. Frost illustrates this theme of destructive emotion by manipulating the title (Fire and Ice) into individual metaphorical symbols. He makes the reader consider the intensely destructive powers of fire and ice, initially, and then relate this power to desire, hatred, passion, and love. Frost uses ice to represent coldness of the heart and to warn that a lack of love and passion will lead to demise. Opposite that, he uses fire to portray the warning about the equally ruinous potential of unbridled emotion and passionate love. Prevention of destruction is all about balance. The more you think about it the poem, the richer it's meaning becomes, but the less tangible it seems. Frost is quite obviously not describing the end of the physical world, but rather an individual destruction due to emotion.
We all know that Frost is known for his symbolic use of nature and natural elements, but this particular poem takes on a different approach to symbolic representation than most of his other poems. In "Fire and Ice" Frost engages the reader with his ironic use of nature in the metaphor, rather than with the innate attention to descriptive detail found in his other works. Reflecting on the power of nature allows the reader to consider the potentially devastating capability of the human psyche to destroy itself. Frost intends for the reader, upon reflection, to realize that neither fire nor ice are intrinsically negative but that both are, in fact, necessary to life. It is only when the fire is uncontrolled that it grows and consumes all that is around it. If passion gets out of hand, it is, without a doubt, personally destructive. On the other hand, thought, you must not be so cold that you destroy yourself in ice. To let your heart die with hatred is just as bad, if not worse, than killing yourself with passion. You must balance out the hot and the cold, because life really is a love and hate kind of thing.