These which were pomp and delight

by

Pedro Calderón de la Barca


These which were pomp and delight,

waking at the first morning light,

will be in the evening a vain object of pity,

sleeping in the arms of the cold night.


This blending of colors that challenges the heavens,

a rainbow striped with gold, snow and scarlet,

will be an object lesson to human life:

So much is attempted in the limits of a single day!


The roses got up early to flower

and flowered to grow old:

they found their cradle and their tomb in a bud.


Even so have people found their fortunes,

in one day have they been born and died;

for when the centuries have passed, they were but hours.



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