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you look where’er you look but on the vanity of
the world
what this one builds today that one razes tomorrow
where nowadays whole cities stand shall be a meadow then
and there a shepherd boy will play and sport among his flocks
what blooms splendid nowadays will soon be trampled under
what boasts and is defiant now tomorrow is but ash and bone
nothing is that ever is neither brass nor marble
now laughs Fortuna on us soon come troubles thunderbolting
the fame of high deeds must dissipate like a dream
shall then the toy of time mere man endure?
oh what is all of this we take for precious
only wretched nothingness only shadows dust and wind
only a meadow flower gone you cannot find again
and yet not one man will seek after what is ever
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