Time is a dream ... a destroying dream;_x000D_ _x000D_ It lays great cities in dust, it fills the seas;_x000D_ _x000D_ It covers the face of beauty, and tumbles walls.
Interpretation
Time is ephemeral and ultimately destructive, affecting everything from beauty to civilizations.
This quote reflects on the transient nature of time, suggesting that it has the power to erode beauty and topple great accomplishments, symbolized by cities and walls. Aiken emphasizes the relentless passage of time, which, despite being an intangible concept, leaves a tangible impact on the world around us.
In practice
In a lecture about the philosophy of time, this quote can illustrate the concept of impermanence.
One cricket said to another -_x000D_ _x000D_ come, let us be ridiculous, and say love!_x000D_ _x000D_ love love love love love_x000D_ _x000D_ let us be absurd, woman, and say hate!_x000D_ _x000D_ hate hate hate hate hate_x000D_ _x000D_ and then let us be angelic_x000D_ _x000D_ and say nothing.
Music I heard with you was more than music, and bread I broke with you was more than bread. Now that I am without you, all is desolate; all that was once so beautiful is dead.
I used to analyze myself down to the last thread, used to compare myself with others, recalled all the smallest glances, smiles and words of those to whom I’d tried to be frank, interpreted everything in a bad light, laughed viciously at my attempts ‘to be like the rest’ –and suddenly, in the midst of my laughing, I’d give way to sadness, fall into ludicrous despondency and once again start the whole process all over again – in short, I went round and round like a squirrel on a wheel.
What an absurd thing it is to pass over all the valuable parts of a man, and fix our attention on his infirmities.
One time, I was given an essay topic: to describe a perfect horse, whom the mere sight of the rider's whip would make obedient. I depicted this perfect horse throwing his rider at the sight of the whip.
Yet not for a single moment did I have any doubts about my own integrity and honour as a woman. I knew that my profession had been invented by men, and that men were in control of both our worlds, the one on earth, and the one in heaven. That men force women to sell their bodies at a price, and that the lowest paid body is that of a wife. All women are prostitutes of one kind or another.
Those oft are stratagems which errors seem Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream.
We have in England a curious belief in first-rate people, meaning all the people we do not know; and this consoles us for the undeniable second-rateness of the people we do know.
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