The speaker tells Hélène that when she is old and gray, she will look back on her life and think about what she could have had and the joy and companionship she would have gained from the speaker.  In Tim McGraw's 1997 song, "One of These Days," a similar scenario occurs.  The song is about the regret that people will have for not cherishing the things they had when they had them.  In one verse, a man tells about a girl who made fun of a boy because "he was different, he wasn't cool like me."  The boy then says that "One of these days you're gonna love me," and how sorry she will be for not giving him a fair chance.  Ronsard says to Hélène, "You'll sing my songs and marvel that you were such a fool; O Ronsard did praise me when I was young and bright."  He also predicts that, "you will yearn for all that's lost, repenting your disdain," just as the man in "One of These Days" says "you'll sit down by yourself and think about the times you pushed and shoved me and what good friends we might have been."  Clearly the connection can be made between two different modes of expression written over a span of four hundred years.

"To Hélène" by Pierre de Ronsard displays the same theme as "One of These Days" by Tim McGraw.  One person laments and predicts about the love that he gave that was rejected by the one he loved.
 

One of These Days - Tim McGraw

You used to chase that boy home from school
called him freckled face and red-headed fool
he was different
he wasn't cool like me
Sticks and stones didn't break any bones
but we never left well enough alone
then one day he ran away from home you see
And I passed him as he walked away
and in his eyes I heard him say

Chorus:
One of these days you're gonna love me
you'll sit down by yourself and think
about the times you pushed and shoved me
and what good friends we might have been
and then you're gonna sigh a little maybe even cry a little
but
one of these days you're gonna love me

Patty Sue was a small town beauty
I took one look at her and had to pull her to me
Lord knows she should've seen right through me
when I promised her the world.
But at 17 you only want one thing
I left her standin' with my high school ring
Innocent tears in the pourin' rain
as I walked away
And I still see her in my dreams
and to this day she's whispering

Chorus

Now everybody stands up
the congregation sings
it's a song of sweet forgiveness
and as the chorus rings
the wind blows clear my memory
the pages start to turn
and suddenly I'm singing
the moment that I learned

One of these days I'm gonna love me
and feel the joy of sweet release
One of these days I'll rise above me
and at last I'll find some peace
and then I'm gonna smile a little
maybe even laugh a little
but
One of these days I'm gonna love me.
 
 

Albert, Susan Witting. et World Literature, revised edition Austin: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1998.

This book is a collection of literature from around the world featuring many religions and great literary works.  Each work has it's own background information and author information, as well as questions at the end of the text

McGraw, Tim. "One of These Days", Everywhere. Nashville: Curb Records, Inc., 1997.