It Withers Quicker Than the Rose

To An Athlete Dying Young by A.E. Housman

The time you won your town the race
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.

To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.

Smart lad, to slip betimes away
From fields where glory does not stay,
And early though the laurel grows
It withers quicker than the rose.

Eyes the shady night has shut
Cannot see the record cut,
And silence sounds no worse than cheers
After earth has stopped the ears:

Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.

So set, before the echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.

And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.

I read this poem as an assignment for my British Literature class, and it has been resonating in my thoughts ever since.

The speaker says how lucky an athlete is who dies young, he can go out with a bang and people will remember him/her for decades to come. This poem is not supposed to be taken literally; he does not want great athletes to die. But the message he is trying to portray states that an athlete who dies young does not have to worry about fading away and living a life that may be full of disappointment and hardship. Rather, they leave this world when they have achieved great success and are at the peak of their abilities.

With the rodeo season coming to an end, this poem really hit home. After the season is over, I’ve decided to give up my rodeo career for a while to focus more on school and other important aspects in my life. This semester, I’ve been successful at the college rodeos and hope to continue that streak with the remaining rodeo. It has been a tough decision to give up a sport that I've been passionate about for so long, but as strange as it sounds, this poem helped give me peace of mind about it. I could pursue rodeo and spend more and more money trying to better myself, and there’s a possibility that I wouldn’t improve. Not saying that I wouldn’t try, but I would much rather go out with a bang. The last rodeo of the season is next weekend in Stephenville, TX. I plan to make it my best rodeo yet and give the performance of my lifetime.

So for now, I’m giving it all I’ve got because that is all I have to give.