A. E. Housman Quotes on Death
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Now, of my threescore years and ten, Twenty will not come again, And take from seventy springs a score, It only leaves me fifty more. And since to look at things in bloom Fifty springs are little room, About the woodlands I will go To see the cherry hung with snow.
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Clay lies still, but blood's a rover; Breath's a ware that will not keep. Up, lad: when the journey's over There'll be time enough to sleep.
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To-day, the road all runners come, Shoulder-high, we bring you home, And set you at your threshold down, Townsman of a stiller town.
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And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.
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They carry back bright to the coiner the mintage of man, The lads that will die in their glory and never be old.
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But from my grave across my brow Plays no wind of healing now, And fire and ice within me fight Beneath the suffocating night.
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Be still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle, Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.
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With rue my heart is laden For golden friends I had, For many a rose-lipt maiden And many a lightfoot lad. By brooks too broad for leaping The lightfoot boys are laid; The rose-lipt girls are sleeping In fields where roses fade.
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He stood, and heard the steeple Sprinkle the quarters on the morning town. One, two, three, four, to market-place and people It tossed them down. Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour, He stood and counted them and cursed his luck; And then the clock collected in the tower Its strength, and struck.
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Hope lies to mortals And most believe her, But man's deceiver Was never mine.
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We now to peace and darkness And earth and thee restore Thy creature that thou madest And wilt cast forth no more.