A Psalm of Life by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) 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 Find 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.
Wisdom is passed down though time in many ways. One of the ways that the ineffable soul expresses itself is through poetry. Somehow with words, poetry captures something beyond words.
From the 1800s, this poem is now in the public domain, but it still contains a powerful message of the eternal nature of the soul, living in the present, and leaving behind an inspiring legacy.
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Thank you for continuously reminding me of the good days of my youth when we were made to READ/READ/ especially Poems. ! THX!