Original artwork, not a still
Let me not live, after my flame lacks oil, to be the snuff of younger spirits.
Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
The speaker hopes not to live on after their vitality fades, only to become the burnt-out remnant of a wick beside livelier younger people. Ageing is imagined as a flame running out of fuel, and the fear is of being merely discarded scraps.
Context reviewed
