Classic Poem

I seek for love — but not a holy thing;
I search for peace — of body not of soul;
I crave the ecstasy the senses bring;
I struggle upward toward an earthly goal.

I thirst for what this world can give and take,
Dipping my fingers in the golden hoard;
If this a dream I would not then awake,
Nor sell to-day for some far-off reward.

And thus and thus I am, no better than
The beasts and birds and little winds that pass.
Let angels come and go, I am a man
Singing among the flowers of the grass.