So instead of fretting about it all, he tells himself that he should instead be calm and think of “the days when we had rest,” that is, the time before he was born, when he was still free of all earth’s troubles. “The arms you bear are brittle” - meaning his “weapons” - his resources to struggle against the problems of life - are fragile, weak and easily broken, while earth and sky - the universe in which we live - was “fixt of old” - made to be what it is long ago - and was made strong, and will not become other than it is. The poet is telling his soul - his mind in modern terms - his “self” - to calm down. The days when we had rest, O soul, for they were long. Think rather,– call to thought, if now you grieve a little, Let’s examine it stanza by stanza:īe still, my soul, be still the arms you bear are brittle,Įarth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong. They are from poem #XLVIII (48)– “Be Still My Soul, Be Still” - In Alfred Edward Housman’s great anthology A Shropshire Lad. “ Oh, why did I awake? When shall I sleep again?” Musing on that poem and its theme, these lines popped into my head: In it, he discusses the brevity of life, which appears as though out of a dream, and is soon gone again. In the past few days, have noticed a great many people coming to this site for my discussion of the “Days of Wine and Roses” poem by Ernest Dowson.
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