English Poetry I: From Chaucer to Gray.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 50. What Is Our Life |
| | | Sir Walter Raleigh (1552(?)–1618) |
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| WHAT is our life? The play of passion. | |
| Our mirth? The music of division: | |
| Our mothers’ wombs the tiring-houses be, | |
| Where we are dressed for life’s short comedy. | |
| The earth the stage; Heaven the spectator is, | 5 |
| Who sits and views whosoe’er doth act amiss. | |
| The graves which hide us from the scorching sun | |
| Are like drawn curtains when the play is done. | |
| Thus playing post we to our latest rest, | |
| And then we die in earnest, not in jest. | 10 |
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