Classic Poem

I do not grope in mystic dusks
For glimmers of a great Design
That casts to epicures dry husks
And pearls to swine —

That cheats the strong, the daring still,
And mocks them with the bitter need —
The spark to forge the iron Will
Into the deed.

Yet grants what precious talents are
To stragglers on the phantom ways
To spend at Dream's grotesque bazaar
For painted days.

I do not ask some bolt of Thought
To open wide the veiling sky
And show the purpose subtly wrought
And planned on high.

I simply ponder, night or day,
A question quite beyond my ken —
The strange, inscrutable, blind way
Of fate with men.

I simply know that right or wrong
Are aspects of my mortal mind;
That faith is frail, that doubt is strong,
And tears are kind.