A psalm of life
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem “A Psalm of Life” was written shortly after the death of his first wife. It was published anonymously in “The Knickerbocker” magazine in October 1838, and included the following year in his collection “Voices of the Night”. Longfellow said of the poem, “I kept it some time in manuscript, unwilling to show it to any one, it being a voice from my inmost heart, at a time when I was rallying from depression.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born on 27 February 1807 in Portland, Maine, US, and he died on 24 March 1882 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, at the age of 75.A poet and educator, Longfellow was the first American to completely translate Dante’s Divine Comedy into English. He wrote many lyric poems known for their musicality, often presenting stories of mythology and legend. He became the most popular American poet of his day and had success overseas.
External links:
-
Watch this video on YouTube
-
Wikipedia page on “A psalm of life”
-
Wikipedia page on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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.