Henry Lawson

A Backward Glance

A Backward Glance - meaning Summary

Regret and Resolved Renewal

The poem is a reflective meditation on past choices and the desire to do better if given another life. The speaker rejects the idea of repeating the same life and expresses regret for wasted opportunities. Knowing what is false and what is real now, the speaker resolves to pursue youthful ideals and to strive upward, promising to follow that guiding vision to the end.

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It is well when you’ve lived in clover, To mourn for the days gone by Would I live the same life over Could I live again? Not I! But, knowing the false from the real, I would strive to ascend: I would seek out my boyhood’s ideal, And follow it to the end.

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