An arrow

[Crabtownboy]

An arrow at the end of its journey is weak, so that it cannot pierce even thin silk.

Chinese proverb

 

[Revmitchell]

An arrow at the beginning of its journey can be dull if its blades have no sharp edges.



Revmitchell

 

[Revmitchell]

An arrow without sharp edges is like an elevator in an outhouse.



Revmitchell

 

[Alcott]

An arrow at the end of its journey is weak, so that it cannot pierce even thin silk.

Chinese proverb

Just like you and the arguments you run out from, Boy.

That's for what the saying seems to mean. But frankly, it's stupid. If "it cannot pierce even thin silk," certainly it can't pierce human or animal flesh. But arrows have done so for thousands of years.

 

[padredurand]

The Arrow and the Song
BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

 

[Sapper Woody]

An arrow at the end of its journey is weak, so that it cannot pierce even thin silk.





Chinese proverb

Yet it pierces the ground. An arrow stops because of gravity pulling down, and usually it's lateral speed is still pretty fast. The only way an arrow's flight would get so slow it couldn't pierce is in a planet where the lateral speed was equal to gravity's pull, the arrow was affected by the atmosphere, and gravity became weaker as the arrow slowed.



In other words, you'd have to be able to shoot it out of the atmosphere where gravity would release it at its apoapsis (apex) in a hyperbolic orbit.

 

[Crabtownboy]

The Arrow and the Song
BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

Thanks for the poem, one I have liked for a long time. Maybe I will start a thread on favorite poems.

 

[Alcott]

The Arrow and the Song
BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
....
I found again in the heart of a friend.

I don't know how old I was when I first tried to read that poem, but I had heard those first 2 verses [lines] quoted before on television, in cartoons and other shows; I think there was a Twilight Zone episode using the first line as a title. Anyway, I thought it was a lot to read, or something, so I 'skimmed' on down and came to the conclusion the poet was saying he found the arrow in the heart of a friend.

 

[padredurand]

I don't know how old I was when I first tried to read that poem, but I had heard those first 2 verses [lines] quoted before on television, in cartoons and other shows; I think there was a Twilight Zone episode using the first line as a title. Anyway, I thought it was a lot to read, or something, so I 'skimmed' on down and came to the conclusion the poet was saying he found the arrow in the heart of a friend.

You skimmed too far. The arrow was found driven into an oak. It was the song lifted in the second stanza he found in the friend's heart.