Wake to the words and wisdom

"Early in the morning, when you find it so hard to get up, have these thoughts ready at hand: 'I am rising to do the work of a human being.'" - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Book 5, 5.1

Time to break off my chains
Time, time to capture time, to carpe diem
Time to accept my own pace
But to face each day as part of more
Time to be me in my strains.

Now I cast off the pall that covered me
Burn the shadows and rags I wore
And once more meet the world again
To re-become a poet and write what I see.

To come back from the unsunned land
Back from the sleeping lazy realm
To build after the twilight of the gods
Greet new dawns in with my hand.

For tomorrow and every day after
I shall bring ancient ways
To this modern metropolis
With wisdom, strength and laughter.