Anima Anceps

Till death have broken     Sweet lifes love-token,     Till all be spoken     That shall be said,     What dost thou praying,     O soul, and playing     With song and saying,     Things flown and fled?     For this we know not     That fresh springs flow not     And fresh griefs grow not     When men are dead;     When strange years cover     Lover and lover,     And joys are over     And tears are shed.     If one days sorrow     Mar the days morrow     If mans life borrow     And mans death pay     If souls once taken,     If lives once shaken,     Arise, awaken,     By night, by day     Why with strong crying     And years of sighing,     Living and dying,     Fast ye and pray?     For all your weeping,     Waking and sleeping,     Death comes to reaping     And takes away.     Though time rend after     Roof-tree from rafter,     A little laughter     Is much more worth     Than thus to measure     The hour, the treasure,     The pain, the pleasure,     The death, the birth;     Grief, when days alter,     Like joy shall falter;     Song-book and psalter,     Mourning and mirth.     Live like the swallow;     Seek not to follow     Where earth is hollow     Under the earth.