A Reckoning

At my age one begins
To chalk up all his sins,
Hoping to wipe the slate
Before it is too late.

Therefore I call to mind
All memories of the kind
That make me wince and sweat
And tremble with regret.

What do these prove to be?
In every one, I see
Shocked faces that, alas,
Now know me for an ass.

Fatuities that I
Have uttered, drunk or dry,
Return now in a rush
And make my old cheek blush.

But how can I repent
From mere embarrassment?
Damn-foolishness can't well
Entitle me to Hell.

Well, I shall put the blame
On the pride that's in my shame.
Of that I must be shriven
Before I'll be forgiven.

-Richard Wilbur-

Iste Mundus

This world, deep in madness raving,
False delights and pleasures yields,
Which desert us, fade around us
Like the lilies of the fields.

Life's mundane distracted prospect
Drives the Heaven from our eyes,
And sinks men's souls in Tartarus,
Where the death-worm never dies.

What we see and taste and touch
Of the world we populate
Falls and withers round about us
Like oak leaves grown to Autumn's date.

The things of flesh and mortal law
Prove their slightness when they fade,
That of swiftly passing shadows
And of breathless bloodless shade.

But should we loose our earthly ties
And deny this world our trust,
We shall find far greater joys
And be numbered with the just,
And shall merit for our wages
To behold the Age of Ages.

-Translated from the Latin by Thomas Banks-

A Dirge in the Woods

A wind sways the pines,
And below,
Not a breath of wild air;
Still as the mosses that grow
On the flooring and over the lines
Of the roots here and there.
The pine tree drops its dead;
They are quiet, as under the sea.
Overhead, overhead
Rushes life in a race,
As the clouds the clouds chase;
And we go,
And we drop like the fruits of the tree,
Even we,
Even so.

-George Meredith-

Sidney

Leave me O Love, which reachest but to dust,
And thou my mind inspire to higher things:
Grow rich in that which never taketh rust:
What ever fades, but fading pleasure brings.

Draw in thy beams, and humble all thy might,
To that sweet yoke, which lasting freedoms be:
Which breaks the clouds and opens forth the light,
That does both shine and give us sight to see.

O take fast hold, let that light be thy guide,
In this small course which birth draws out to death,
And think how evil becometh him to slide,
Who seeketh heav'n, and come to heavenly breath.
Then farewell world, thy uttermost I see,
Eternal Love maintain thy life in me.

-Sir Philip Sidney-

When the Eye of Day Is Shut

When the eye of day is shut,
And the stars deny their beams,
And about the forest hut
Blows the roaring wood of dreams,

From deep clay, from desert rock,
From the sunk sands of the main,
Come not at my door to knock,
Hearts that loved me not again.

Sleep, be still, turn to your rest
In the lands where you are laid;
In far lodgings east and west
Lie down on the beds you made.

In gross marl, in blowing dust,
In the drowning ooze of sea,
Where you would not, lie you must,
Lie you must, and not with me.

-A.E. Housman-

More Bridges

The first we met we did not guess
That Love would prove so hard a master;
Of more than common friendliness
When first we met we did not guess.
Who could foretell this sore distress,
This irretrievable disaster
When first we met? We did not guess
That Love would prove so hard a master.

-Robert Bridges-

Some Bridges

All women born are so perverse
No man need boast of their possessing.
If naught seems better, nothing's worse;
All women born are so perverse.
From Adam's wife, that proved a curse
Though God had made her for a blessing,
All women born are so perverse
No man need boast their love possessing.

-Robert Bridges-