IF sweet my songs, or these sufficient be Which I have sung to give renown to me, I know not: but it misbeseems to strain At things we have not learned, and toil in vain. If sweet these songs are not, what profit more Have I to labour at them o'er and o'er? If Saturn's son and changeful Fate assigned A double life-time to our mortal kind, That one in joys and one in woes be past, Who had his woes first would have joys at last. But since Heaven wills one life to man should fall, And this is very brief—too brief for all We think to do, why should we fret and moil, And vex ourselves with never-ending toil? To what end waste we life exhaust our health On gainful arts, and sigh for greater wealth? We surely all forget our mortal state— How brief the life allotted us by Fate! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BERTHA IN THE LANE by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING HALLOWED GROUND by THOMAS CAMPBELL DEAD COW FARM by ROBERT RANKE GRAVES THE MAY QUEEN by ALFRED TENNYSON TO WALTER LIONEL DE ROTHSCHILD ON HIS BAR-MITZVAH by LOUIS BARNETT ABRAHAMS |