I remember, when I was young, my grandma having this enigmatic prose poem on her wall. For some reason I never actually asked her about it; I was merely aware of it and its strangely sagacious words. Beginning strikingly with “Go placidly amid the noise and the haste…”, and continuing with a series of sage aphorisms, I assumed it to be of unknown authorship, and of ancient, perhaps biblical, origin. It was titled Desiderata, which did little to dispel the idea of antiquity.
Time moved on and the piece became half-forgotten. Many years later, however, during a family stay in Haworth, and browsing in an art shop, I came across these words again, and remarked: “My gosh, I know this poem, it used to be on my grandma’s wall!”. My beautiful and thoughtful daughter, Freya, must have quietly noted and internalised my enthusiasm, because when Father’s Day came around, I unwrapped a present from her to find the words of Desiderata carefully, painstakingly written out, as shown below.
As you can see, unlike my grandma’s Desiderata, Freya’s version supplied a name and date: Max Ehrmann and 1927, so I did a little research. Max Ehrmann was an American writer and poet, of German descent, living and working in his home town of Terre Haute, Indiana, when he wrote Desiderata (Latin for “things to be desired”). It turns out that the poem wasn’t even published during Ehrmann’s lifetime; his widow published it in The Poems of Max Ehrmann in 1948. Even then it remained largely unknown, and probably would have stayed that way had it not become the subject of a lawsuit in the seventies, after it had been printed in a magazine without permission. It was deemed by the court to have had its copyright forfeited and to be in the public domain, and this gave it the impetus to be printed in poster form and distributed widely as a set of inspirational dictums; the words connected favourably with people and ended up, as in my grandma’s case, on their walls.
So my assumption of its antiquity was way off the mark, but it seems that I wasn’t the only one to mistake its provenance: in the fifties, the rector of St Paul’s Church in Baltimore, Maryland, used the poem in a collection of devotional materials, that he headed “Old St Paul’s Church, Baltimore AC 1692” (meaning that the church had been founded in 1692). As the material was handed from one friend to another, the authorship became clouded, and a later publisher would interpret this notation as meaning that the poem itself had been found in Old St Paul’s Church, dated 1692.
This confusion no doubt added to the charm and appeal of the poem, and the words were ripe, I suppose, for the inheritors of the “make peace, not war” sensibility of the 1960s. In any event, its message is timeless and its words worthy of examination to this day, particularly at the dawn of a new year when, inundated with bad and divisive news, we might focus on the final stanza and remind ourselves that “With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.”
Now, read on…
Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
