Man
Quotes
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We bow our heads before Thee, and we laud
And magnify thy name Almighty God!
But man is thy most awful instrument
In working out a pure intent.
And magnify thy name Almighty God!
But man is thy most awful instrument
In working out a pure intent.
Ode. Imagination before Content
Ah, what a warning for a thoughtless man,
Could field or grove, could any spot of earth,
Show to his eye an image of the pangs
Which it hath witnessed,—render back an echo
Of the sad steps by which it hath been trod!
Could field or grove, could any spot of earth,
Show to his eye an image of the pangs
Which it hath witnessed,—render back an echo
Of the sad steps by which it hath been trod!
The Excursion
I pray for fashion's word is out
And prayer comes round again
That I may seem, though I die old,
A foolish, passionate man.
And prayer comes round again
That I may seem, though I die old,
A foolish, passionate man.
A Full Moon in March, 1935. A Prayer for Old Age
That toil of growing up;
The ignominy of boyhood; the distress
Of boyhood changing into man;
The unfinished man and his pain.
The ignominy of boyhood; the distress
Of boyhood changing into man;
The unfinished man and his pain.
The Winding Stair and Other Poems, 1933. A Dialogue of Self and Soul
Everything that man esteems
Endures a moment or a day.
Love's pleasure drives his love away,
The painter's brush consumes his dreams.
Endures a moment or a day.
Love's pleasure drives his love away,
The painter's brush consumes his dreams.
The Tower, 1928. Two Songs from a Play
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 unaging intellect.
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 unaging intellect.
The Tower, 1928. Sailing to Byzantium
The best things and best people rise out of their separateness; I'm against a homogenized society because I want the cream to rise.
What? Was man made a wheel-work to wind up,
And be discharged, and straight wound up anew?
No! grown, his growth lasts; taught, he ne'er forgets:
May learn a thousand things, not twice the same.
And be discharged, and straight wound up anew?
No! grown, his growth lasts; taught, he ne'er forgets:
May learn a thousand things, not twice the same.
A Death in the Desert
That low man seeks a little thing to do,
Sees it and does it:
This high man, with a great thing to pursue,
Dies ere he knows it.
That low man goes on adding one to one,
His hundred's soon hit:
This high man, aiming at a million,
Misses an unit.
That, has the world here should he need the next,
Let the world mind him!
This, throws himself on God, and unperplext
Seeking shall find Him.
Sees it and does it:
This high man, with a great thing to pursue,
Dies ere he knows it.
That low man goes on adding one to one,
His hundred's soon hit:
This high man, aiming at a million,
Misses an unit.
That, has the world here should he need the next,
Let the world mind him!
This, throws himself on God, and unperplext
Seeking shall find Him.
A Grammarian's Funeral
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