日日人空老 날마다 사람은 허무하게 늙고
年年春更歸 해마다 봄은 다시 돌아오네
라고 쓴 王維의 말 같이 그 끈질기던 늦추위도 이제 가버리고 또다시 봄이 오고 있습니다. 곧 이곳 골프장도 열리니 나가볼 준비를 한다마는 몇년이나 더 칠 수 있으려는지 합니다. 벌써 젊은 사람들과는 어울리지 않는답니다.
Crabbed age and youth cannot live together:
Youth is full of pleasance, age is full of care;
Youth like summer morn, age like winter weather;
Youth like summer brave, age like winter bare.
Youth is full of sport, age’s breath is short;
Youth is nimble, age is lame;
Youth is hot and bold, age is weak and cold;
Youth is wild, and age is tame.
Age, I do abhor thee; youth, I adore thee;
O, my love, my love is young!
Age, I do defy thee: O, sweet shepherd, hie thee,
For methinks thou stay’st too long.
누구나 이 Shakespeare의 글을 대할 때 화가 치오르겠지만 이것은 부정할 수 없는 사실이지요. 그렇다 할지라도
Trunken müssen wir alle sein! (We all ought to be drunk!)
Jugend ist Trunkenheit ohne Wein; (Youth is drunkenness without wine;)
Trinkt sich das Alter wieder zu Jugend, (If old age can drink itself back to youth,)
So ist es wundervolle Tugend. (That is a wonderful virtue.)
라는 Goethe의 말에는 동의하지 않을겁니다. 그보다는 Anna Lætitia Barbauld와 동감할 수 있겠지요;
Life! We’ve been long together,
Through pleasant and through cloudy weather;
‘Tis hard to part when friends are dear;
Perhaps ‘twill cost a sigh , a tear;
Then steal away, give little warning,
Choose thine own time;
Say not Good night, but in some brighter clime
Bid me Good morning.
Tagore는 한 단계 더 나아간 듯 합니다;
On the day when death will knock at thy door,
What wilt thou offer to him?
Oh, I will set before my guest the full vessel of my life;
I will never let him go with empty hands.
All the sweet vintage of all my autumn days and summer nights,
All the earnings and gleanings of my busy life,
Will I place before him at the close of my days
When death will knock at my door.