Vanitas Vanitatum
Died 1630?
ALL the flowers of the spring
Meet to perfume our burying;
These have but their growing prime,
And man does flourish but his time:
Survey our progress from our birth--
We are set, we grow, we turn to earth.
Courts adieu, and all delights,
All bewitching appetites!
Sweetest breath and clearest eye
Like perfumes go out and die;
And consequently this is done
As shadows wait upon the sun.
Vain the ambition of kings
Who seek by trophies and dead things
To leave a living name behind,
And weave but nets to catch the wind.
DayPoems Poem No. 220
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/220.html">Vanitas Vanitatum by John Webster</a>
The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
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