dots-menu
×

Edward Farr, ed. Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth. 1845.

Vita Tota Dies Vnut

LVIII. Henry Peacham

OF all our life behold the very summe,

Which, as this flower, continues but a day;

Our youth is morne, our middle age is come

By noone, at night as fast we doe decay

As doth this lillie, flowring with the sunne,

But withred ere his race be fully runne.

Wherefore our life’s resembled, to a shippe,

Which passeth on, though we do what we please;

A shade, a flower that euery frost doth nippe,

A dreame, a froath, a waue vpon the seas,

Which hath awhile his being, till anon

Some else intrude, and hee’s forgot and gon.