IT is not, y' are deceiv'd, it is not bliss, What you conceive a happy living is: To have your hands with rubies bright to glow, Then on your tortoise bed your body throw, And sink yourself in down; to drink in gold, And have your looser self in purple roll'd; With royal fare to make the tables groan, Or else with what from Libyc fields is mown; Nor in one vault hoard all your magazine: But at no coward's fate t' have frighted bin, Nor with the people's breath to be swoll'n great, Nor at a drawn stiletto basely sweat. He that dares this, nothing to him's unfit, But proud o' th' top of Fortune's wheel may sit. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SEVEN TWILIGHTS: 7 by CONRAD AIKEN SONG: SO OFTEN, SO LONG I HAVE THOUGHT by HAYDEN CARRUTH THE SITTING by CECIL DAY LEWIS THE MAN TO BE by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON THE BEAST OF BURDEN by MARIANNE MOORE |