An Ancient Sanskrit Poem:
Look well to this day,
for it is life.
In its brief course lie all the realities
and truths of existence.
The joy of growths,
the splendour of action,
the glory of power.
For yesterday is but a memory,
and tomorrow is only a vision,
but today, if well-lived,
makes every yesterday a memory of happiness,
and every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore, to this day.
A pic from a couple weeks ago when I played with some baby tigers in Chiang Mai, Thailand. It made me think back to fourth grade when we had to memorize the following poem by William Blake:
Tiger Tiger, Burning bright
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire,
What the hand dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder and what art
Could twist the sinnews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat
What dread hand, what dread feet?
What the hammer, what the chain
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil, what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
And when the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Tiger, Tiger burning bright,
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
(Wow, can't believe I just typed it from memory!)
