30 Nov 2014

Thomas Osbert Mordaunt (1730–1809)

"One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name."



Hmmmm.... don't know if I feel that way about my nameless ages or not........



1 comment:

  1. "One crowded hour of glorious life
    Is worth an age without a name."
    So said some Mordaunt new to me,
    So unknown was his fame.
    I'd rather crowd an age with life,
    And gloriously glory in the same.

    Pithy quotes are quoted, yup,
    But now and then I think
    That not all that's posterity spoke
    Is much more than a wink
    In the longer streams and sands of time
    Which conquer both rosebud and the stink.

    One crowded hour is not enough
    And names tell names, not more
    Than that a name's remembered
    Across time's distant shore.
    I'll gladly savor a lifetime
    With many crowded hours' roar.

    Thomas Osbert, more than that,
    Is remembered, we'll allow
    For: "Go then, thou little lovely boy,
    I can not, must not, hear thee now...."
    So goes the quote oft-quoted,
    One cited poem, anyhow.

    Crowd the hours, crowd the days,
    And crowd a lifetime with worth.
    If one's name's not long remembered,
    This abrogates not death nor birth.
    Anonymous writes with no-name pens,
    Yet anonymous spans both age and earth.

    Nameless ages are just fine,
    And fame we know is fleeting.
    Ungraspable love, unknown lives
    Are worth more than poems' bleating.
    Who knows anyone, knows life too,
    Even those unknown, with a greeting.

    A nonny mouse thinks of you,
    Across what spans the distance.
    What need the names? What cares the world?
    The anonymous plies persistence.
    Names are names, but there is more,
    As proves one's anonymous existence.

    Smiles from a nonny mouse --

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