Dare We Be Lovers?

Carpe Diem   O mistress mine, where are you roaming? O stay and hear! your true-love’s coming That can sing both high and low; Trip no further, pretty sweeting, Journey’s end in lovers’ meeting– Every wise man’s son doth know. What is love? ’tis not hereafter; Present mirth hath present laughter; What’s to come is still unsure: In delay there lies no plenty,– Then come kiss me, Sweet and twenty, Youth’s a stuff will not endure.   William Shakespeare   I think that Shakespeare is trying to convince his lover that she needs to stop worrying about the future.  He is basically saying that he doesn’t know where this relationship will lead.  It may not have a pleasant future but we do not need to worry about that now.  Let us enjoy it while it is still beautiful.  Kiss me while we still enjoy kissing each other.  This is evident in the lines, “Present mirth hath present laughter; whats to come is still unsure.”  He is saying that he can’t promise that this relationship will work out, but they should still give it a try.    I like this poem because I have experienced this same situation.  I have had friends that I was attracted to and the feelings were mutual, however, we decided that we should just stay friends.  We stayed friends because we did not want to loose our friendship that we had.  This poem gets me thinking about it and it makes me wish that I had risked it instead.  Shakespeare says, “Youth’s a stuff will not endure.”  He is right.  We do not stay young forever.  I do not talk with this old friend of mine anymore so our reason was wasted.  It would have been better to follow Shakespeare’s advice and live for the moment.