Classic Poem

Beginning millenniums back
We were given of the cup of the Earth to drink:
A cup of the blood of torment and love:
A cup set to our emerging and vanishing lips again and again through a million years:
And we have waxed on agony: seed has become man.

But behold! now from the rivers of blood the prophets of peace lift up,
Out of the pain rises a running and wingèd joy,
And out of the lamentation springs a laughter!