When Death hath poured oblivion through my veins,
And brought me home, as all are brought, to lie
In that vast house, common to serfs and Thanes,
I shall not die, I shall not utterly die,
For beauty born of beauty-- that remains.
Death induces the sensual person to say: Let us eat and drink, because tomorrow we shall die - but this is sensuality's cowardly lust for life, that contemptible order of things where one lives in order to eat and drink instead of eating and drinking in order to live.
For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun? And what is it to cease breathing but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered? Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountaintop,then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shal claim your limbs,then shall you truly dance.
Never lie, steal, cheat, or drink. But if you must lie, lie in the arms of the one you love. If you must steal, steal away from bad company. If you must cheat, cheat death. And if you must drink, drink in the moments that take your breath away.
Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.
The stars of midnight shall be dear To her; and she shall lean her ear In many a secret place Where rivulets dance their wayward round, And beauty born of murmuring sound Shall pass into her face.
The moon has set In a bank of jet That fringes the Western sky, The pleiads seven Have sunk from heaven And the midnight hurries by; My hopes are flown And, alas! alone On my weary couch I lie.
Tomorrow may never come to us. We do not live in tomorrow. We cannot find it in any of our title-deeds. The man who owns whole blocks of real estate, and great ships on the sea, does not own a single minute of tomorrow. Tomorrow! It is a mysterious possibility, not yet born. It lies under the seal of midnight-behind the veil of glittering constellations.
Alas! while the body stands so broad and brawny, must the soul lie blinded, dwarfed, stupefied, almost annihilated? Alas! this was, too, a breath of God, bestowed in heaven, but on earth never to be unfolded!
For I dance And drink and sing, Till some blind hand Shall brush my wing. If thought is life And strength and breath And the want Of thought is death Then am I A happy fly If I live Or if I die
I am for those who believe in loose delights, I share the midnight orgies of young men, I dance with the dancers and drink with the drinkers.
I shall dance all my life. . . . I would like to die, breathless, spent, at the end of a dance.
Defeat, my defeat, my deathless courage, You and I shall laugh together with the storm, And together we shall dig graves for all that die in us, and we shall stand in the sun with a will, And we shall be dangerous
I do what I love to do at the moment. If I wake up tomorrow and decide I want to dance, that's what I'd do. Or design clothes. I think I'd throw myself into whatever I'm doing now. It's not about abandoning what I was doing before, or giving up. It's about knowing that if I die tomorrow, I lived the way I wanted to.
Today While the blossoms still cling to the vine I'll taste your strawberries I'll drink your sweet wine A million tomorrows shall all pass away Here I forget all the joy that is mine. Today I'll be a dandy and I'll be a rover You know who I am by the songs that I sing I'll feast at your table I'll sleep in your clover Who cares what tomorrow shall bring I can't be contented with yesterday's glory I can't live on promises winter to spring Today is my moment and now is my story I'll laugh and I'll cry and I'll sing