Death is a supple suitor, that wins at last. It is a stealthy wooing; conducted first by pallid innuendos and dim approach, but brave at last with bugles.
Leaves have their time to fall, And flowers to wither at the north - wind's breath, And stars to set; but all, Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death!
I live now on borrowed time, waiting in the anteroom for the summons that will inevitably come. And then - I go on to the next thing, whatever it is. One doesn't, luckily, have to bother about that.
A man dies not for the many wounds that pierce his breast, unless it be that life's end keep pace with death, nor by sitting on his hearth at home doth he the more escape his appointed doom.
And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to try to alarm me.... And as to you corpse, I think you are good manure, but that does not offend me, I smell the white roses sweet-scented and growing, I reach to the leafy lips — I reach to the polished breasts of melons. And as to you life, I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths, No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.
We are all compelled to take the same road; from the urn of death, shaken for all, sooner or later the lot must come forth.
[Lat., Omnes eodem cogimur; omnium
Versatur urna serius, ocius
Sors exitura.]
We are all bound thither; we are hastening to the same common goal. Black death calls all things under the sway of its laws.
[Lat., Tendimus huc omnes; metam properamus ad unam. Omnia sub leges mors vocat atra suas.]