Well, like many sayings, this one has been twisted over time. As I cited in my poem and essay, https://medium.com/technical-excellence/carpe-diem-a323490fe3cc , this article https://daily.jstor.org/how-carpe-diem-got-lost-in-translation/ says:

"As Latin scholar Maria S. Marsilio points out, “carpe diem” is a horticultural metaphor that, particularly seen in the context of the poem, is more accurately translated as “plucking the day,” evoking the plucking and gathering of ripening fruits or flowers, enjoying a moment that is rooted in the sensory experience of nature. “Gather ye rose-buds while ye may” is the famed Robert Herrick version. But let’s not be persnickety; aren’t these merely two different metaphors that mean essentially the same thing?

Well, yes and no. It’s an example of one of the more telling ways that we mistranslate metaphors from one language to another, revealing in the process our hidden assumptions about what we really value. Metaphors may map to similar meanings across languages, but their subtle differences can have a profound effect on our understanding of the world."