The more we live, more brief appear
Our life's succeeding stages;
A day to childhood seems a year,
And years like passing ages.
The gladsome current of our youth,
Ere passion yet disorders,
Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.
But as the careworn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker,
Ye stars, that measure life to man,
Why seem your courses quicker?
When joys have lost their bloom and breath,
And life itself is vapid,
Why, as we reach the Falls of Death
Feel we its tide more rapid?
It may be strange—yet who would change
Time's course to slower speeding,
When one by one our friends have gone,
And left our bosoms bleeding?
Heaven gives our years of fading strength
Indemnifying fleetness;
And those of youth, a seeming length,
Proportion'd to their sweetness.
《二》
人生颂
（青年诗人内心自白）
享利·沃兹沃斯·朗费罗 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 1807-1882年 美国诗人
A PSALM OF LIFE
WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN
SAID TO THE PSALMIST
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.
《三》
瞬间
克里斯蒂娜·乔治娜·罗赛蒂 Christina Gabriel Rossetti 1830—1894 英国女诗人
They made the chamber sweet with flowers and leaves,
And the bed sweet with flowers on which I lay;
While my soul, love-bound, loitered on its way.
I did not hear the birds about the eaves,
Nor hear the reapers talk among the sheaves:
Only my soul kept watch from day to day,
My thirsty soul kept watch for one away:--
Perhaps he loves, I thought, remembers, grieves.
At length there came the step upon the stair,
Upon the lock the old familiar hand:
Then first my spirit seemed to scent the air
Of Paradise; then first the tardy sand
Of time ran golden; and I felt my hair
Put on a glory,and my soul expand.
《四》
青春飞逝
理查德·亨利·斯托达德 Richard Henry Stoddard (1825-1903 美国诗人
There are gains for all our losses.
There are balms for all our pain:
But when youth, the dream, departs
It takes something from our hearts,
And it never comes again.
We are stronger, and are better,
Under manhood's sterner reign:
Still we feel that something sweet
Followed youth, with flying feet,
And will never come again.
Something beautiful is vanished,
And we sigh for it in vain;
We behold it everywhere,
On the earth, and in the air,
But it never comes again!
Life...What is it?
See it in the colors of autumn,
A gentle snowfall in winter,
A sudden shower in spring,
The radiance of a summer day.
Behold it in the laughter Of the young and the old.
Know of it in a surge of hope,
The blessings that are bountiful.
What is life?
It is joy,awareness,
And the music within.
《六》
莫悲伤
约翰·弗莱彻 John Fletcher
点评
人生的欢乐如梦幻转瞬即逝，哀痛唤不回逝去的时光，何必总把忧愁放在心上？
止住泪水，何必叹息呻吟，
哀痛唤不回逝去的时光；
掐断的紫罗兰鲜活不再，
甘甜的雨露无法让它从新生长。
肉眼凡胎看不透隐秘的命运，
开心一笑吧，对镜梳妆。
欢乐如梦幻转瞬即逝，
为何总把忧愁放在心上？
痛心只会令人更加心痛，
温柔的美人啊，千万千万莫再悲伤。
Weep no more
WEEP no more, nor sigh, nor groan,
Sorrow calls no time that 's gone:
Violets pluck'd, the sweetest rain
Makes not fresh nor grow again.
Trim thy locks, look cheerfully;
Fate's hid ends eyes cannot see.
Joys as wingèd dreams fly fast,
Why should sadness longer last?
Grief is but a wound to woe;
Gentlest fair, mourn, mourn no moe.