They will rage because they have lost so much opportunity to enjoy the world.įor me this poem is a lesson, that life is struggle, even in the act of trying to savour every moment we are lost to addiction, to the desire for the next 'thing'. That it is our will that makes us happy or sad, not the external world. Grave Men, people who have been sad for their lives, realise that being happy or sad is in the mind. Wild men who seek to capture every joy from life, realise that in the act of 'seizing the day' they were really all the time filled with the fear of it's impending loss. And perhaps worse, understand that no-one much noticed their efforts. Good men who have sought to make the world a better place, will be sad when they do not succeed, in a world with a closed heart.
In life they will have sought to teach others the things that they know, but will feel empty when they have been unable to make others see what they see, when they have been unable to pass the gift of their vision onto others. Wise men know that death is a part of life, it is integral to it's operation and as such is 'right'. With so many poor interpretations I thought I would add my own to the mix: