INDICATES LIFE'S ESSENTIAL BREVITY, UNEXPECTED AND WITH SUFFERING, ASSAULTED BY DEATH

Yesterday a dream; tomorrow dust!
Nothing, just before; just after, smoke!
And I plot out ambitions, and can claim
not one point on the siege that circling looms!

The briefest skirmish in a pressing war,
I bring great peril to my own defense;
while I consume myself with my own arms,
my body less gives lodging than entombs.

Yesterday's no more; tomorrow's late;
today moves on, and is, and was, with steps
that send me, headlong, down into death's cave.

The hour and the moment are mere spades
which, for the wages of my grief and woes,
now excavate in my life my own grave.