On Time

Yet another gem:

Fly, envious Time, till thou run out thy race,
Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours,
Whose speed is but the heavy Plummets’ pace;
And glut thyself with what thy womb devours,
Which is no more than what is false and vain,
And merely mortal dross;
So little is our loss,
So little is thy gain.

For when as each thing bad thou hast entomb’d,
And last of all, thy greedy self consum’d,
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss;
And Joy shall overtake us as a flood,
When every thing that is sincerely good
And perfectly divine,
With Truth, and Peace, and Love shall ever shine.

About the supreme Throne
Of Him, t’whose happy-making sight alone,
When once our heav’nly-guided soul shall climb,
Then all this earthly grossness quit,
Attir’d with Stars, we shall for ever sit,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee O Time.

by John Milton (1608 -1674)

2 thoughts on “On Time

  1. Kip Watson

    Thanks, what a beautiful poem.

    When you think of Christians, let it men like this.

    This is almost like a response to Donne’s ‘Death be not Proud’.

    I just bought a bunch of poetry recently (Brecht included, believe it or not). I need more colour in my life…

    Reply
  2. Bob Hentges Post author

    When you think of Christians, let it men like this.

    What do you mean? That I should imagine all the Christians as people like him?

    Sorry won’t work. There are just as many stupid or intelligent (let’s stay polite – we are having a nice discussion here after all) Christians then there are stupid people somewhere else.

    I just can’t go ahead and allow myself the liberty to use one specimen and say that he describes all of his kind.

    Reply

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