A Psalm of Life by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - with thoughts →
A Psalm of Life
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - 1807-1882
What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist
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 art, to dust returnest,"
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Finds us farther than to-day.
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.
In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,--act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing
Learn to labor and to wait
Thoughts about this Poem
This poem describes the purpose of life and how one should handle the sorrow and struggles along the way. The poem begins with the speaker contradicting a listener who wants to explain life to him as a matter of numbers and figures. It reminds me of "The Winds of Fate” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
One ship drives East and another West,
With the self-same winds that blow.
’Tis the set of the sail, and not the gale,
Which tells us the way to go.
Both poems tell us,. “Life is real! Life is earnest!” it is up to us how we let the winds of life influence and direct us.
Both poems inspired me as I wrote the book, “Work Matters: Insights and Strategies for Job Seekers in this Rapidly Changing Economy
“The Hill We Climb” - Amanda Gorman →
When day comes we ask ourselves, where can we find light in this neverending shade? The loss we carry, a sea we must wade. We’ve braved the belly of the beast, we’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace and the norms and notions of what just is, isn’t always justice. And yet the dawn is ours before we knew it, somehow we do it, somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken but simply unfinished.
We, the successors of a country and a time where a skinny black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one. And, yes, we are far from polished, far from pristine, but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect, we are striving to forge a union with purpose, to compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and conditions of man.
So we lift our gazes not to what stands between us, but what stands before us. We close the divide because we know to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside. We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another, we seek harm to none and harmony for all.
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true: that even as we grieved, we grew, even as we hurt, we hoped, that even as we tired, we tried, that we’ll forever be tied together victorious, not because we will never again know defeat but because we will never again sow division.
Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and no one should make them afraid. If we’re to live up to our own time, then victory won’t lie in the blade, but in in all of the bridges we’ve made.
That is the promise to glade, the hill we climb if only we dare it because being American is more than a pride we inherit, it’s the past we step into and how we repair it. We’ve seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it. That would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy, and this effort very nearly succeeded. But while democracy can periodically be delayed, but it can never be permanently defeated.
In this truth, in this faith, we trust, for while we have our eyes on the future, history has its eyes on us, this is the era of just redemption we feared in its inception we did not feel prepared to be the heirs of such a terrifying hour but within it we found the power to author a new chapter, to offer hope and laughter to ourselves, so while once we asked how can we possibly prevail over catastrophe, now we assert how could catastrophe possibly prevail over us.
We will not march back to what was but move to what shall be, a country that is bruised but whole, benevolent but bold, fierce and free, we will not be turned around or interrupted by intimidation because we know our inaction and inertia will be the inheritance of the next generation, our blunders become their burden. But one thing is certain: if we merge mercy with might and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and change our children’s birthright.
So let us leave behind a country better than the one we were left, with every breath from my bronze, pounded chest, we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one, we will rise from the golden hills of the West, we will rise from the windswept Northeast where our forefathers first realized revolution, we will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the Midwestern states, we will rise from the sunbaked South, we will rebuild, reconcile, and recover in every known nook of our nation in every corner called our country our people diverse and beautiful will emerge battered and beautiful, when the day comes we step out of the shade aflame and unafraid, the new dawn blooms as we free it, for there is always light if only we’re brave enough to see it, if only we’re brave enough to be it.
“Hope” is the Thing With Feathers, by Emily Dickinson" →
“Hope” is the Thing With feathers
BY EMILY DICKINSON
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -
I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
……………………
About this Poem
"'Hope' is the Thing with Feathers" reminds us that hope lives inside us all. We are never alone in tribulation, as hope is there, singing the voice of encouragement.
Serving as a metaphor, it likens the concept of hope to a feathered bird permanently perched in every human's soul.
The symbol of the bird as hope works well in part because the bird is free and self-reliant and also a symbol of spirituality
Amanda Gorman Profile →
Amanda S. C. Gorman - is an American poet and activist focusing on oppression, feminism, race, and marginalization. Gorman was the first to be named National Youth Poet Laureate and published the poetry book “The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough.”
How did Amanda Gorman fix her speech impediment?
Ultimately, reciting poetry provided her with her greatest strength — her voice. In an interview, she told CBS This Morning that poetry served as a form of speech pathology, and through lots of practice, she overcame her speech impediment. She said she recited poetry, spoken word, and rap to help her learn how to say "r" words.
Gorman drew upon the contemporary style of spoken-word poetry, which emphasizes the rhythms and rhymes of the poet's voice as she speaks. For example, spoken-word poets treat poems as performances rather than texts for silent contemplation.
Contemporary poetry is most often written in free verse (unrhymed lines). The lines follow the natural rhythms of the language and not the strict five stresses per line in iambic pentameter. Contemporary poetry is written in language that is accessible to the ordinary reader.
“Never a day did I feel more loved & lovely
Never a day did I soar as more me
Where absolutely nothing was held above me
But waiting always before me”
The Hill We Climb Poem by Amanda Gorman →
And yet the dawn is ours
before we knew it.
Somehow we do it.
Somehow we've weathered and witnessed
a nation that isn't broken,
but simply unfinished.
We the successors of a country and a time
where a skinny Black girl
descended from slaves and raised by a single mother
can dream of becoming president
only to find herself reciting for one.
And yes we are far from polished.
Far from pristine.
But that doesn't mean we are
striving to form a union that is perfect.
We are striving to forge a union with purpose,
to compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and
conditions of man.
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us,
but what stands before us.
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first,
we must first put our differences aside.
We lay down our arms
so we can reach out our arms
to one another.
We seek harm to none and harmony for all.
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true,
that even as we grieved, we grew,
that even as we hurt, we hoped,
that even as we tired, we tried,
that we'll forever be tied together, victorious.
Not because we will never again know defeat,
but because we will never again sow division.
Scripture tells us to envision
that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree
and no one shall make them afraid.
If we're to live up to our own time,
then victory won't lie in the blade.
But in all the bridges we've made,
that is the promise to glade,
the hill we climb.
If only we dare.
It's because being American is more than a pride we inherit,
it's the past we step into
and how we repair it.
We've seen a force that would shatter our nation
rather than share it.
Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy.
And this effort very nearly succeeded.
But while democracy can be periodically delayed,
it can never be permanently defeated.
In this truth,
in this faith we trust.
For while we have our eyes on the future,
history has its eyes on us.
This is the era of just redemption
we feared at its inception.
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs
of such a terrifying hour
but within it we found the power
to author a new chapter.
To offer hope and laughter to ourselves.
So while once we asked,
how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe?
Now we assert,
How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?
We will not march back to what was,
but move to what shall be.
A country that is bruised but whole,
benevolent but bold,
fierce and free.
We will not be turned around
or interrupted by intimidation,
because we know our inaction and inertia
will be the inheritance of the next generation.
Our blunders become their burdens.
But one thing is certain,
If we merge mercy with might,
and might with right,
then love becomes our legacy,
and change our children's birthright.
So let us leave behind a country
better than the one we were left with.
Every breath from my bronze-pounded chest,
we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one.
We will rise from the gold-limbed hills of the west.
We will rise from the windswept northeast,
where our forefathers first realized revolution.
We will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the midwestern states.
We will rise from the sunbaked south.
We will rebuild, reconcile and recover.
And every known nook of our nation and
every corner called our country,
our people diverse and beautiful will emerge,
battered and beautiful.
When day comes we step out of the shade,
aflame and unafraid,
the new dawn blooms as we free it.
For there is always light,
if only we're brave enough to see it.
If only we're brave enough to be it.
Why I am excited about Amanda Gorman's new book "Call Us What We Carry" →
Inaugural Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman’s poem from the 2021 Inauguration, Call Us What We Carry, was formerly titled The Hill We Climb and Other Poems.
The poem, “The Hill We Climb,” is the moving poem she read at the inauguration of the 46th President of the United States, Joe Biden. Gorman was born March 7th, 1998 and her stunning performance signals an exiting future for her poetry style and a new voice of influence.
Press releases have referred to this book as a “remarkable new collection reveals an energizing and unforgettable voice in American poetry bursting with musical language and exploring themes of identity, grief, and memory”.
Not everyone loves or even likes good poetry. Personally I love good poetry and Gorman’s style is exciting. Her choice of words bring strong focus to her subject and the rhythm and cadence drive the message. You can hear her voice even as you just read the words.
Is Bob Dylan's song Blowin in the Wind (Series of Dreams) Poetry or just a song? →
It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream. —Edgar Allan Poe
Dylan’s wrote the words in this song but the question is whether it is a poem or a song? The words work together, not alone. The words make their own music but to focus only on the words isn’t enough.
Poetry is literature that evokes imaginative awareness of experience or a specific emotional response through language chosen and arranged for its meaning, sound, and rhythm.
Series of Dreams
(is it a poem or a song?)
I was thinking of a series of dreams
Where nothing comes up to the top.
Everything stays down where it's wounded
And comes to a permanent stop.
Wasn't thinking of anything specific,
Like in a dream, when someone wakes up and screams.
Nothing truly very scientific,
Just thinking of a series of dreams.
Thinking of a series of dreams
Where the time and the tempo drag,
And there's no exit in any direction
'Cept the one that you can't see with your eyes.
Wasn't making any great connections, Wasn't falling for any intricate schemes.
Nothing that would pass inspection,
Just thinking of a series of dreams.
Dreams where the umbrella is folded, And into the path you are hurled,
And the cards are no good that you're holding
Unless they're from another world.
Click to hear Bob Dylan’s song, Series of Dreams
A Dream Within A Dream, by Edgar Allan Poe →
A Dream Within a Dream
by Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow —
You are not wrong; who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand —
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep — while I weep!
O God! Can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?
Analysis of Poem
By “a dream within a dream”, Poe describes that neither one of those dreams is more real than the other. He adds and implies that in life all we see, or seem to see, is nothing more than a dream within a dream.
The overall message is the poet’s doubt and uncertainty about the nature of reality. He questions whether life itself is just an illusion, trying to understand his own life’s path.
This picture should be labeled fantasy and seems to be a dream within a dream.
Does Poetry inspire Non Fiction? →
Poetry Can Inspire and Shape Feelings and Emotions That can Lead to Nonfiction
Poetry shows the Poet’s feelings and emotions, and in that sense, it is nonfiction. The reader may connect with the implied feelings and emotions as well as the message in the words. That connection can lead to expression by the reader that could be either nonfiction or fiction.
These poems describe the purpose of life and how one should handle the sorrow and struggles along the way. The poem begins with the speaker contradicting a listener who wants to explain life to him as a matter of numbers and figures. It reminds me of:
"The Winds of Fate” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
One ship drives east and another west,
With the self-same winds that blow.
’Tis the set of the sail, and not the gale,
Which tells us the way to go.
Both poems tell us, “Life is real! Life is earnest!” it is up to us how we let the winds of life influence and direct us. Both poems inspired me as I wrote the book, “Work Matters: Insights and Strategies for Job Seekers in this Rapidly Changing Economy.”
A Psalm of Life
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - 1807-1882
What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist
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 art, to dust returnest,"
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Finds us farther than to-day.
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.
In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,--act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God overhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing
Learn to labor and to wait.
Eldorado, by Edgar Allan Poe →
Eldorado the Poem by Edgar Allen Poe
Read morePeople Come into your Life for a Reason, a Season or a Lifetime - Poem by Anonymous →
Why This Poem Matters
This poem didn’t draw attention through promotion—it resonated. It continues to be the most visited page on this site, connecting with readers who are searching for meaning, reflection, and perspective. The words below continue to shape my thinking, and they might do the same for you.
🌿 People Come into Your Life for a Reason …
“People come into your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.” You’ll know what to do for each person when you figure out which one it is.
When someone is in your life for a reason, it’s usually to meet a specific need you’ve expressed. They may offer support during a difficult time—emotionally, spiritually, or even physically. They are there because you need them to be. And then, just as suddenly, they leave. Not because of anything you’ve done, but because their role is complete. They may walk away. They may pass on. Or they may do something that forces a turning point. Whatever the reason, their purpose is fulfilled. The prayer you didn’t even realize you uttered has been answered. It’s time to let go and move forward.
Others come into your life for a season. This is your moment to grow, to learn, to experience something new. They might make you laugh, inspire joy, or teach you a new way of seeing the world. These connections are often vibrant, exciting, and meaningful—but they are not meant to last. They’re real. They matter. But only for a season.
Then there are the people who stay for a lifetime. They teach you lasting lessons. They help you build a foundation of emotional strength, resilience, and wisdom. Your role is to receive the assignment, love the person, and carry those lessons into all other relationships. It’s been said that love is blind, but friendship is clairvoyant.
💬 Interpreting the Poem: A Framework for Growth and Letting Go
Many people resonate deeply with this way of seeing life—as if people cross our paths not by chance, but with purpose.
They see signs. They trust that needs will be met through others. Even when someone brings harm or hardship, they view it as a teacher in disguise—an opportunity to grow, to reflect, to learn what not to do next time.
This poem doesn’t just offer comfort. It offers a framework—one that gently invites us to accept impermanence, appreciate the moment, and recognize the people in our lives as part of something larger.
After all, where else would we learn life’s most important lessons, if not from the people around us?
🌿 How This Poem Influenced Me
This website didn’t begin as a place for poetry. It started as a book review site, and over time, I added a few favorite poems that have deeply influenced me. While most of the content here focuses on personal reinvention—a theme central to my books and philosophy—this particular page, and this poem, have taken on a life of their own.
Each month, this is the most visited page on the site. It consistently ranks at the top of a Google search for this poem, drawing in readers from around the world. That popularity speaks to something deeper—this poem resonates. It resonates with people’s experiences of relationships, change, and personal growth.
It also blends seamlessly into my broader philosophy about life. My belief in personal reinvention—how we adapt, evolve, and redefine ourselves—begins with the kind of insight found in this poem. It reminds us that people come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime, and understanding that helps us navigate change with more grace.
This poem directly influenced several of my books, including:
– Why Life Stories Change: As You Look At Your Own Life Story, You See Yourself Differently
– Why Life Stories Change: Are We The Result of Chance or Circumstance
– Embrace Life's Randomness: Your Path to Personal Reinvention and Positive Change
Its message helped shape how I write, how I reflect, and how I view the role of relationships in our personal transformation.
📝 Companion Essay
This essay expands on the same theme—how revisiting your past can reshape your present and future.
If It Really Was My Life Story, Why Does It Change Each Time I Tell It?
There is no one whose story I know more intimately than my own. The same is true for you. That may seem obvious, yet what continues to surprise me is how differently I see my story each time I tell it.
Details I once considered essential fade in importance, while other pieces—once minor—begin to feel more meaningful. Coincidences come into sharper focus, and my perspective shifts. Each retelling changes the story, and in doing so, changes me. We reshape who we are by revisiting and reinterpreting the same events.
Author Pat Conroy once said, “The most powerful words in the English language are ‘tell me a story.’” I’ve witnessed firsthand how telling one’s story can transform a person—not by altering the facts, but by reframing the meaning behind those facts.
For over 35 years, I participated in a monthly men’s group at my local church. Each meeting, one person would share their life story in a 45-minute window. Originally, the goal was simple: to help us get to know one another. Many men are slow to open up, and this format created space for appreciation and connection.
Over time, as members came and went, some of us repeated our stories. That’s when something interesting emerged: people began telling the same story differently. Not fabricated, just reframed. They had come to new conclusions, made fresh connections, or viewed the past with new eyes. The same events—now seasoned with reflection—carried a different weight.
I experienced it myself. Moments I once saw as setbacks I later understood as turning points. People I once considered minor characters in my life’s script turned out to be pivotal.
This realization echoes the message of the poem: people and events enter our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. But we often don’t know which until much later. In hindsight, we see the influence. We recognize that a relationship or encounter helped shape our path—even if we didn’t understand its impact at the time.
As our perspective evolves, so does our personal narrative. And as our story changes, so do we.
As we look back on the people who’ve shaped our lives, we often realize we’ve changed too.
👉 [Read: You’re Not Who You Were Yesterday: Why We’re Always Becoming]
Just as people shape our stories, so does the literature we engage with.
👉 [Read: Literary Influences on Society and Culture]
The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow →
The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Read moreA Question by Robert Frost (What does this poem mean and what is the question asked) →
A Question, by Robert Frost
A voice said, Look me in the stars
And tell me truly, men of earth,
If all the soul-and-body scars
Were not too much to pay for birth
Thoughts about the poem, A Question”
Is this a reflection on our past life or is it a question asking us if we properly value our life? The poem prompts us to analyze our lives and the value and worth. Was being born a blessing and a privilege or was it a curse?
The voice of the poem address the “men of the earth” bringing the question to your attention of your value and confirms that the questions you will find in your pondering will have answers. but also suggests that acceptance of the choices you made is also an answer.
"A Question" is a poem by Robert Frost, first published in 1942”
“The Builders” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow →
The Builders” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
All are architects of Fate,
Working in these walls of Time;
Some with massive deeds and great,
Some with ornaments of rhyme.
Nothing useless is, or low;
Each thing in its place is best;
And what seems but idle show
Strengthens and supports the rest.
For the structure that we raise,
Time is with materials filled;
Our to-days and yesterdays
Are the blocks with which we build.
Truly shape and fashion these;
Leave no yawning gaps between;
Think not, because no man sees,
Such things will remain unseen.
In the elder days of Art,
Builders wrought with greatest care
Each minute and unseen part;
For the Gods see everywhere.
Let us do our work as well,
Both the unseen and the seen;
Make the house, where Gods may dwell,
Beautiful, entire, and clean.
Else our lives are incomplete,
Standing in these walls of Time,
Broken stairways, where the feet
Stumble as they seek to climb.
Build to-day, then, strong and sure,
With a firm and ample base;
And ascending and secure
Shall to-morrow find its place.
Thus alone can we attain
To those turrets, where the eye
Sees the world as one vast plain,
And one boundless reach of sky
And ascending and secure
Shall to-morrow find its place.
We spend our lives working. We work in our jobs to be able to care for ourselves and our families. We work for our families to teach them how to live and how to work. Everything we do gets down to work and the question of why we work comes down to the fact that life requires it and rewards it.
It isn’t our profession that defines who we are rather it is our values that define us. Our values are revealed in how we mop the floor as well as how we approach technology or science. Our values when combined with work create relationships and trust and reflect the set of our sail and the direction of our lives.
Longfellow argues in this poem that all of us are architects and that our days are building blocks that contribute to the structure of our existence; and all of our actions and decisions determine our strength, and potential.
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud by William Wordsworth →
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
Analysis of this Poem
"I wandered lonely as a Cloud" is a poem that just makes you feel peace and solitude. It says that even if you are alone you can use your imagination to find friends in the beauthy of nature. It suggests a value to the earth itself. Wordsworth most famous poem.
There Will Come Soft Rain, by Sara Teasdale →
There will come soft rain and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
Analysis and Thoughts: The author describes nature using the senses of a living being to give nature life and meaning.
Words like “smell of the ground,” “shallows circling,” “shimmering sound,” and “Robins will wear,” she personifies nature to give it a human-like approach.
She sums up her thoughts saying “Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree”, but that one is not mankind whom she feels could perish without being missed. For her nature exists alone.
Soft rain has been referred to being like white noise, able to calm us down. The words turn us to nature which also reduces anger, fear, and stress and increases pleasant feelings.
Bring on the Soft Rain.
“Sailing to Byzantium” by W. B. Yeats →
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
Byzantium was an ancient Greek city in classical antiquity that became known as Constantinople in the late antiquity and Istanbul today. Yeats tell us of great poetry from long ago.
You, by Edgar Albert Guest →
You are the fellow that has to decide
Whether you'll do it or toss it aside.
You are the fellow who makes up your mind
Whether you'll lead or will linger behind
Whether you'll try for the goal that's afar
Or just be contented to stay where you are.
Take it or leave it. Here's something to do!
Just think it over — It's all up to you!
What do you wish? To be known as a shirk,
Known as a good man who's willing to work,
Scorned for a loafer or praised by your chief,
Rich man or poor man or beggar or thief?
Eager or earnest or dull through the day,
Honest or crooked? It's you who must say!
You must decide in the face of the test
Whether you'll shirk it or give it your best.
Nobody here will compel you to rise;
No one will force you to open your eyes;
No one will answer for you yes or no,
Whether to stay there or whether to go.
Life is a game, but it's you who must say,
Whether as cheat or as sportsman you'll play.
Fate may betray you, but you settle first
Whether to live to your best or your worst.
So, whatever it is you are wanting to be,
Remember, to fashion the choice you are free.
Kindly or selfish, or gentle or strong,
Keeping the right way or taking the wrong,
Careless of honor or guarding your pride,
All these are questions which you must decide.
Yours the selection, whichever you do;
The thing men call character's all up to you!
The Gift Outright by Robert Frost
John F. Kennedy Inauguration - Picture by New York Times
"The Gift Outright"
Poem recited at John F. Kennedy's Inauguration
by Robert Frost
The land was ours before we were the land’s.
She was our land more than a hundred years
Before we were her people. She was ours
In Massachusetts, in Virginia,
But we were England’s, still colonials,
Possessing what we still were unpossessed by,
Possessed by what we now no more possessed.
Something we were withholding made us weak
Until we found out that it was ourselves
We were withholding from our land of living,
And forthwith found salvation in surrender.
Such as we were we gave ourselves outright
(The deed of gift was many deeds of war)
To the land vaguely realizing westward,
But still unstoried, artless, unenhanced,
Such as she was, such as she would become.
Thoughts about this Poem
Robert Frost, the poet chosen to deliver a powerful message at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy, takes us on a journey through America's history, from its colonial past to its emergence as a sovereign nation. He poignantly reminds us that America was ours, even before we were hers, a land that we were tied to England. He underscores the profound lessons the land taught us about freedom. In a symbolic gesture, Kennedy requests Frost to alter the last line from “Such as she would become” to “Such as she will become”, a change that echoes Kennedy's unwavering optimism.
