Next in our journey through classic poetry, I’d like to talk about time. The brevity and preciousness of time is a very important and deep theme in classical poetry. Poets often loved the contrast of the unhurried, unchanging beauties of nature with the blind busyness of man who soon returns to dust. I think of these two lines by WB Yeats:
“We and the labouring world are passing by
Amid men’s souls that waver and give place.â€
Poets of the classical world were often dismayed by the brevity of all life, of seizing the day, and living life to the full. Time is short, and things are beautiful for only a little while. I love the way the following excepts encourage us to treat time as a precious thing, and not to squander it on cheap and commonplace things.
Recently, more than ever before, I’ve begun to feel the slow tug of time at my doorstep. Time, which has always been the mellow stream I’ve gone a-fishing in, now has started to become the swift current that’s slowly dragging me away. Many of you have felt the same feelings. Sometimes, time just seems like it’s running out. It was Henry David Thoreau who coined the quote above, which is the title of this article. His view of time, and what he did with his life have always been able to inspire me toward better things, breaking the nagging discouragement that sometimes comes to find me. That’s why I’m writing this article, for those of you like me, who have felt the nagging, discouraging pull of time. I’m posting my favorite quotes about life and the preciousness of time to remind myself and others that time is precious, and that life ought to be fought for rather than settled for.
Whenever I have this feeling, I love going back to poems written on the subject of time, or the preciousness of life. I think of the Greek phrase Carpe Diem, Seize the Day. In this selection, I’ve chosen a number of excerpts of poems, as well as quotes. I hope you enjoy. The first is by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, A Psalm of Life.
“Tell me not in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou are, to dust thou returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each tomorrow
Find us farther than today.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.â€
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“Let fate do her worst, there are relics of joy,
Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot destroy;
Which come in the night-time of sorrow and care,
And bring back the features that joy used to wear.
Long, long be my heart with such memories filled!
Like the vase, in which flowers have once been distilled –
You may break, you may shatter the vase, if you will,
But the scent of the roses will hang round it still.â€
Thomas Moore
“Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day
Tomorrow will be dying.â€
Robert Herrick
However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names. It is not so bad as you are. It looks poorest when you are richest. The faultfinder will find fault even in paradise. Love your life, poor as it is. You may perhaps have some pleasant thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poor-house.†Henry David Thoreau.
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.†Henry David Thoreau.
