As the future ripens in the past,
so the past rots in the future —
a terrible festival of dead leaves.
Your past is always your past. Even if you forget it, it remembers you.
Futures not achieved are only branches of the past: dead branches.
Some say that the age of chivalry is past, that the spirit of romance is dead. The age of chivalry is never past, so long as there is a wrong left unredressed on earth.
We live in the age of idols. The pagan past, never dead, flames again in our mystic hierarchies of stardom.
To remain in the past means to be dead.
I've never tried to block out the memories of the past, even though some are painful.
The past is the only dead thing that smells sweet.
Shall we never never get rid of this Past?… It lies upon the Present like a giant's dead body.
I dreamt the past was never past redeeming:
But whether this was false or honest dreaming
I beg death's pardon now. And mourn the dead.