Instants

If I could live again my life, 
In the next - I'll try, 
- to make more mistakes, 
I won't try to be so perfect, 
I'll be more relaxed, 
I'll be more full - than I am now, 
In fact, I'll take fewer things seriously, 
I'll be less hygenic, 
I'll take more risks, 
I'll take more trips, 
I'll watch more sunsets, 
I'll climb more mountains, 
I'll swim more rivers, 
I'll go to more places - I've never been, 
I'll eat more ice creams and less (lime) beans, 
I'll have more real problems - and less imaginary 
ones, 
I was one of those people who live 
prudent and prolific lives - 
each minute of his life, 
Offcourse that I had moments of joy - but, 
if I could go back I'll try to have only good moments, 

If you don't know - thats what life is made of, 
Don't lose the now! 

I was one of those who never goes anywhere 
without a thermometer, 
without a hot-water bottle, 
and without an umberella and without a parachute, 

If I could live again - I will travel light, 
If I could live again - I'll try to work bare feet 
at the beginning of spring till 
the end of autumn, 
I'll ride more carts, 
I'll watch more sunrises and play with more children, 
If I have the life to live - but now I am 85, 
- and I know that I am dying ... 

Jorge Luis Borges

This is a slightly different interpretation of a Li Po poem I've already posted. I think I like this version better!

Amidst the Flowers a Jug of Wine

Amidst the flowers a jug of wine,
I pour alone lacking companionship.
So raising the cup I invite the Moon,
Then turn to my shadow which makes three of us.
Because the Moon does not know how to drink,
My shadow merely follows the movement of my body.
The moon has brought the shadow to keep me company a while,
The practice of mirth should keep pace with spring.
I start a song and the moon begins to reel,
I rise and dance and the shadow moves grotesquely.
While I'm still conscious let's rejoice with one another,
After I'm drunk let each one go his way.
Let us bind ourselves for ever for passionless journeyings.
Let us swear to meet again far in the Milky Way.

Li Po

This poem definitely doesn't make the last days of old age very appealling. Then again, I suppose the truth is bitter in this regard and the "last stage of all" is truly not glamorous but macabre! HERE'S TO GROWING OLD AND LOSING EVERYTHING WE'VE GAINED IN LIFE!!!

Growing Old

What is it to grow old?
Is it to lose the glory of the form,
The lustre of the eye?
Is it for beauty to forego her wreath?
Yes, but not for this alone.

Is it to feel our strength -
Not our bloom only, but our strength -decay?
Is it to feel each limb
Grow stiffer, every function less exact,
Each nerve more weakly strung?

Yes, this, and more! but not,
Ah, 'tis not what in youth we dreamed 'twould be!
'Tis not to have our life
Mellowed and softened as with sunset-glow,
A golden day's decline!

'Tis not to see the world
As from a height, with rapt prophetic eyes,
And heart profoundly stirred;
And weep, and feel the fulness of the past,
The years that are no more!

It is to spend long days
And not once feel that we were ever young.
It is to add, immured
In the hot prison of the present, month
To month with weary pain.

It is to suffer this,
And feel but half, and feebly, what we feel:
Deep in our hidden heart
Festers the dull remembrance of a change,
But no emotion -none.

It is -last stage of all -
When we are frozen up within, and quite
The phantom of ourselves,
To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost
Which blamed the living man.

Matthew Arnold

Found this on BoingBoing. Just had to repost!

Wow...can't say I'm really THAT suprised considering the origins of Coca-Cola! The USA has a long history of crazy things!

This is an awesome flipbook animation sketched on a notepad of the history of everything! Definitely worth watching!!!

Hark! Hark! The Lark

Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,
And Phoebus 'gins arise,
His steeds to water at those springs
On chalic'd flowers that lies;
And winking Mary-buds begin
To ope their golden eyes;
With everything that pretty is,
My lady sweet, arise:
Arise, arise!

William Shakespeare

Infinite

These solitary hills have always been dear to me.
Seated here, this sweet hedge, which blocks the distant horizon opening inner silences and interminable distances.
I plunge in thought to where my heart, frightened, pulls back.
Like the wind which I hear tossing the trembling plants which surround me, a voice from the inner depths of spirit shakes the certitudes of thought.
Eternity breaks through time, past and present intermingle in her image.
In the inner shadows I lose myself,
drowning in the sea-depths of timeless love.

Giacomo Leopardi

Here Dead We Lie

Here dead we lie
Because we did not choose
To live and shame the land
From which we sprung.

Life, to be sure,
Is nothing much to lose,
But young men think it is,
And we were young.

Alfred Edward Housman

I think the title says it all, really!

apprehension grew as i crawled
into the den of the mother
may we all be well fed
to survive her winter