What though the radiance which was once so bright Be not forever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; Grief not, rather find, Strength in what remains behind, In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be, In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of Human suffering, In the faith that looks through death In years that bring philophic mind.
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And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years, I can cheefully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait... And as to you, Life, I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths, (No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.)
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Years of love have been forgot, In the hatred of a minute.
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To be seventy years old is like climbing the Alps. You reach a snow-crowned summit, and see behind you the deep valley stretching miles and miles away, and before you other summits higher and whiter, which you may have strength to climb, or may not. Then you sit down and meditate and wonder which it will be.
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We turn not older with years, but newer every day.
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What though the radiance which was once so bright Be not forever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower Strength in what remains behind, In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be, In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of Human suffering, In the faith that looks through death In years that bring philophic mind.
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I spent millons of years in the world of inorganic things as a star, as a rock... Then I died and became a plant-- Forgetting my former existence because of its otherness Then I died and became an animal-- Forgetting my life as a plant except for inclinations in the season of spring and sweet herbs-- like the inclination of babes toward their mother's breast Then I died and became a human My intelligence ripened, awakening from greed and self-seeking to become wise and knowing I behold a hundred thousand intelligences most marvelous and remember my former states and inclinations And when I die again I will soar past the angels to places I cannot imagine Now, what have I ever lost by dying?
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So daddy, I'm finally through. The black telephone's off at the root, The voices just can't worm through. If I've killed one man, I've killed two -- The vampire who said he was you And drank my blood for a year, Seven years, if you want to know. Daddy, you can lie back now. There's a stake in your fat black heart And the villagers never liked you. They are dancing and stamping on you. They always knew it was you. Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through.
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We are students of words: we are shut up in schools, and colleges, and recitation-rooms, for ten or fifteen years, and come out at last with a...
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A slumber did my spirit seal;/ I had no human fears:/ She seemed a thing that could not feel/ The touch of earthly years. No motion has she now, no force;/ She neither hears nor sees;/ Rolled round in earth's diurnal course. . .
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Four years and thirty, told this very week,Have I been now a sojourner on earth,And yet the morning gladness is not goneWhich then was in my mind.
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I remember two years ago a bunch of us went out on the boat and it was my birthday. We had a great time out there. That's the little things you miss. Johnny was a great person. He was the first guy to step in front of the media when things weren't right, when things were right.
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The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life
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137 years later, Memorial Day remains one of America's most cherished patriotic observances. The spirit of this day has not changed - it remains a day to honor those who died defending our freedom and democracy.
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To look almost pretty, is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain the first fifteen years of her life, than a be...
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For a hundred years I breathe and live, the flower of beauty and the bread of kindness. I am your friendly shade in the noonday heat of summer, and I stand pencilled against the winter twilight, a silhouette for dreams. At dawning in the spring I am filled with song, the host to a thousand birds, and I decorate the autumn with pageantry and colour. Then comes the woodsman with his axe. And still I serve. I am the timber that builds your boat; the rafters of your cathedrals; the choirstalls of your church enriched by the magic of the carver's fingers. I am the beam that holds your house; the door of your homestead, and the lintel too. I am the handle of your hoe; the wood of your cradle; the bed on which you lie; the board of your table and the board for your bread. When I am living, harm me not. When I am dead, respect me and use me kindly.
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A woman's always younger than a man of equal years.
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The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness. We drink too much, smoke too much, spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get too angry, stay up too late, get up too tired, read too little, watch TV too much, and pray too seldom. We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often. We've learned how to make a living, but not a life. We've added years to life not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbor. We conquered outer space but not inner space. We've done larger things, but not better things. We've cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We've conquered the atom, but not our prejudice. We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less. We've learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less. These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion, big men and small character, steep profits and shallow relationships. These are the days of two incomes but more divorce, fancier houses, but broken homes. These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill. It is a time when there is much in the showroom window and nothing in the stockroom. A time when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to share this insight, or to just hit delete.
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Nothing is more memorable than a smell. One scent can be unexpected, momentary and fleeting, yet conjure up a childhood summer beside a lake in the mountains; another, a moonlit beach; a third, a family dinner of pot roast and sweet potatoes during a myrtle-mad August in a Midwestern town. Smells detonate softly in our memory like poignant land mines hidden under the weedy mass of years. Hit a tripwire of smell and memories explode all at once. A complex vision leaps out of the undergrowth.
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There is here no measuring with time, no year matters, and ten years are nothing. Being an artist means, not reckoning and counting, but ripening like the tree which does not force it's sap and stands confident in the storms of Spring without the fear that after them may come no Summer. It does come. I learn it daily, learn it with pain to which I am grateful
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And Nothing is very strong: strong enough to steal away a man's best years not in sweet sins but in a dreary flickering of the mind over it knows not what and knows not why, in the gratification of curiosities so feeble that the man is only half aware of them, in drumming of fingers and kicking of heels, in whistling tunes that he does not like, or in the long, dim labyrinth of reveries that have not even lust or ambition to give them a relish, but which, once chance association has started them, the creature is too weak and fuddled to shake off.
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The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. And then you die. What's that? A bonus? I think the life-cycle is all backwards. You should die first and get it all over with. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you're too young. You get a gold watch. You go to work. You work forty years until you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol and party. You get ready for high school. You go to grade school and become a kid. You play. You have no responsibilities. You become a little baby & go back into the womb. You spend your last nine months floating... Then, you finish off as an orgasm. I like it.
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The thought of our past years in me doth breed Perpetual benedictions.
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When Apollo Mission Astronaut Neil Armstrong first walked on the moon, he not only gave his famous one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind statement but followed it by several remarks, usual com traffic between him, the other astronauts and Mission Control. Just before he re-entered the lander, however, he made the enigmatic remark; 'Good luck Mr. Gorsky.'
Many people at NASA thought it was a casual remark concerning some rival Soviet Cosmonaut. However, upon checking, there was no Mr. Gorsky in either the Russian or American space programs. Over the years many people questioned Armstrong as to what the Good luck Mr. Gorsky statement meant, but Armstrong always just smiled.
Just last year, (on 5 July 1995 in Tampa Bay, FL) while answering questions following a speech, a reporter brought up the 26-year-old question to Armstrong. This time he finally responded. Mr. Gorsky had finally died and so Neil Armstrong felt he could answer the question.
When he was a kid, he was playing baseball with a friend in the backyard. His friend hits a fly ball which landed in the front of his neighbors bedroom windows. His neighbors were Mr. And Mrs. Gorsky.
As he leaned down to pick up the ball, young Armstrong heard Mrs. Gorsky shouting at Mr. Gorsky. 'Oral sex! You want oral sex?! You'll get oral sex when the kid next door walks on the moon!'
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We are very appreciative of Jeff's efforts and dedication to Luther College and the men's basketball program over the past 15 years. Under Jeff's leadership, the men's basketball program has been competitive, continually displayed a high level of integrity, and enriched the lives of our student-athletes both on and off the basketball court.
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I figure I'll be champ for about ten years and then I'll let my brother take over - like the Kennedys down in Washington.
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Naked as paper to start But in twenty-five years she'll be silver, In fifty, gold.
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I am young, I am twenty years old; yet I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and fatuous superficiality cast over an abyss of sorrow. I see how peoples are set against one another, and in silence, unknowingly, foolishly, obediently, innocently slay one another.
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LOOKING-GLASS, n. A vitreous plane upon which to display a fleeting show for man's disillusion given. The King of Manchuria had a magic looking-glass, whereon whoso looked saw, not his own image, but only that of the king. A certain courtier who had long enjoyed the king's favor and was thereby enriched beyond any other subject of the realm, said to the king: Give me, I pray, thy wonderful mirror, so that when absent out of thine august presence I may yet do homage before thy visible shadow, prostrating myself night and morning in the glory of thy benign countenance, as which nothing has so divine splendor, O Noonday Sun of the Universe! Please with the speech, the king commanded that the mirror be conveyed to the courtier's palace; but after, having gone thither without apprisal, he found it in an apartment where was naught but idle lumber. And the mirror was dimmed with dust and overlaced with cobwebs. This so angered him that he fisted it hard, shattering the glass, and was sorely hurt. Enraged all the more by this mischance, he commanded that the ungrateful courtier be thrown into prison, and that the glass be repaired and taken back to his own palace; and this was done. But when the king looked again on the mirror he saw not his image as before, but only the figure of a crowned ass, having a bloody bandage on one of its hinder hooves --as the artificers and all who had looked upon it had before discerned but feared to report. Taught wisdom and charity, the king restored his courtier to liberty, had the mirror set into the back of the throne and reigned many years with justice and humility; and one day when he fell asleep in death while on the throne, the whole court saw in the mirror the luminous figure of an angel, which remains to this day.
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To be young is all there is in the world. They talk so beautifully about work and having a family and a home (and I do, too, sometimes) --but it's all worry and head-aches and respectable poverty and forced gushing. Telling people how nice it is, when, in reality, you would give all of your last thirty years for one of your first thirty. Old people are tremendous frauds.
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