To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time

Written: 1648 • Published: 1648

lyric carpe-diem youth time mortality marriage beauty urgent playful advisory wistful

Public Domain

This poem is in the public domain and may be freely reproduced.

Gather ye rose-buds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying; And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun, The higher he’s a-getting, The sooner will his race be run, And nearer he’s to setting.

That age is best which is the first, When youth and blood are warmer; But being spent, the worse, and worst Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time, And while ye may, go marry; For having lost but once your prime, You may forever tarry.

Curator's Note

Herrick's 'Gather ye rosebuds while ye may' has become the eternal cry of carpe diem poetry. Written by a bachelor clergyman in his 50s, the poem advises young women that their beauty is fleeting—'Old time is still a-flying'—and they should marry while they can. Modern readers might bristle at the patriarchal urgency, but the poem's imagery remains gorgeous: the dying rose, the sun's race from dawn to dusk, youth as a precious window. It's the Cavalier poets at their finest—classical themes in perfectly turned English verse, pleasure and anxiety in equal measure.