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Whereat some one of the loquacious Lot - I think a Sufi pipkin-waxing hot - 'All this of Pot and Potter - Tell me then, Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot?'
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Strange, is it not? that of the myriads who Before us pass'd the door of Darkness through, Not one returns to tell us of the Road, Which to discover we must travel too.
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Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, Before we too into the Dust descend; Dust into Dust, and under Dust to lie Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and - sans End!
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And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press End in what All begins and ends in - Yes; Think then you are To-day what Yesterday You were - To-morrow You shall not be less.
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Then said a Second - 'Ne'er a peevish Boy Would break the Bowl from which he drank in joy, And He that with his hand the Vessel made Will surely not in after Wrath destroy'.
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The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes, But Here or There as strikes the Player goes; And He that toss'd you down into the Field, He knows about it all - He knows - HE knows!
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Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring Your Winter-garment of Repentance fling: The Bird of Time has but a little way To flutter - and the Bird is on the Wing.
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Said one among them - 'Surely not in vain My substance of the common Earth was ta'en And to this Figure moulded, to be broke, Or trampled back to shapeless Earth again'.
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Yon rising Moon that looks for us again - How oft hereafter will she wax and wane; How oft hereafter rising look for us Through this same Garden - and for one in vain!
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Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before I swore - but was I sober when I swore? And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand My thread-bare Penitence apieces tore.
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Oh, Thou, who didst with pitfall and with gin Beset the Road I was to wander in, Thou wilt not with Predestined Evil round Enmesh, and then impute my Fall to Sin!
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When You and I behind the Veil are past, Oh, but the long, long while the World shall last, Which of our Coming and Departure heeds As the Sea's self should heed a pebble-cast.
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Heav'n but the Vision of fulfill'd Desire, And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire, Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves, So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.
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But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days; Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays, And one by one back in the Closet lays.