Too Late -- Too Soon

Regrets of wasted youth at the hour of death [Rubaiyat]

Too Late – Too Soon

The crisp, clean snow slips from the bough
and trickles down life’s beaten brow
to rest in pools of squandered dreams,
no more to grasp or disavow.

His angels toll, and God, it seems,
has written brief life’s final schemes.
I can’t return and right the crime.
He waits for me by Heaven’s streams.

I journey back through clouds of time,
recalling fleeting Youth’s sublime,
sweet wonderment and now lament
my disregard for short-lived prime.

That age misspent in argument,
rebellious music, dark dissent.
If I’d known then the bough was bent,
I might have been less discontent.

              



[Interlocking Rubaiyat Quatrain -- Iambic Tetrameter]
Aaba – bbcb – ccdc -- dddd
For example see:
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
by Robert Frost