Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the

“Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the now.” – Audre Lorde

These words, spoken by Audre Lorde, rise like a flame in the darkness—a reminder that time is not a river we can sail forever, but a spark that burns brightly and then is gone. In this brief utterance, there is both mourning and commandment: mourning for the fleetingness of life, and a commandment to awaken—to act, to love, to create, now. For the poet knew that life is very short, not merely in the counting of years, but in the measure of chances lost, of words unsaid, of courage delayed.

Audre Lorde, a warrior of truth and a voice for those silenced, spoke from the edge of mortality itself. As she faced illness and the nearness of death, she wrote and spoke as one who could see the fragile veil between existence and eternity. Her cry—“what we have to do must be done in the now”—was not despair, but awakening. It was the wisdom of one who had seen that time is not promised, and that hesitation is a thief more deadly than death. For death takes the body, but hesitation steals the soul’s purpose before the grave ever does.

The ancients too understood this law of urgency. Marcus Aurelius, emperor and philosopher, wrote that a man should act each day “as if it were his last.” He, who held an empire in his hands, knew that even kings are but dust beneath the sun. And yet, how many live as though eternity were their inheritance? They wait for the perfect hour, for courage to ripen, for the world to smile upon their plans. But the now is all we are ever given; the rest is illusion. Tomorrow is the shadow of a promise that may never come.

Consider the life of Lorde herself—a Black woman, a poet, a teacher, and a fighter against injustice. She did not wait for the world to make room for her voice; she carved space with her words. When others counseled silence, she spoke. When fear said, “not yet,” she answered, “now.” In her final years, even as her strength waned, she continued to write, to teach, to burn with purpose. She knew that to delay truth, to delay love, to delay change, is to betray the very miracle of being alive.

There is a certain heroism in her call, a reminder that life is short, but meaning is vast. The length of our days does not measure the depth of our living. Some live eighty years and never awaken; others live one blazing decade and leave the world forever changed. What makes the difference is not the ticking of clocks, but the urgency of the soul—the willingness to live as if this heartbeat were the last.

Therefore, O listener of tomorrow, learn this wisdom: do not postpone your becoming. If there is a word you must speak, speak it now. If there is love you must give, give it now. If there is a dream that trembles within you, trembling is no excuse—begin it now. For what we have to do must be done in the now, not in the someday that never comes. Every act of goodness delayed weakens the world; every act of courage taken strengthens it.

Remember this as you walk beneath the sky: time is the one gift that cannot be stored, only spent. And to spend it wisely is to spend it wholly in the present. Let no fear or doubt chain your hands. Live fully, as Lorde did—fierce, awake, aflame. For when the end comes, as it must for all, may you look back not with regret for what you postponed, but with peace, knowing you lived each moment as if it were eternity itself. That is the power, and the promise, of now.