Classic Poem

I DO not murmur I am thrown
Upon life's empty years,
For I who walk with death for friend
Trade not with fears.

I smile to look at other folk
Who smile to look at me:
They little know what eyes I have
Nor what they see.

For I have smiled in Nineveh,
And I have loved in Tyre,
And I have seen fair Helen's face
Fade in the fire.

When Cleopatra watched the work
Of poison, I was there;
Her fingers felt my breast grow cold,
Her harp player.

I sought three arrows that were sent
The friend of Jonathan,
And I have seen the moon stand still
In Ajalon.

From everlasting I am come,
To everlasting go, —
The pageant of the centuries
Can work no woe.

The galley-master beat with whips
And fed me broken bread;
I faced him fairly eye to eye
Till I was dead.

I drank the hemlock cup of sleep
And bade my friends be still;
I hung between two lonely men
Upon a hill.

On other worlds I set my feet
And visit other stars,
And other spears have pierced my side
And left strange scars.

I do not bend to men of scorn
Nor measure what they say,
For all their generations are
But as a day.

I look behind the hearts of men,
I see their secret thought,
I speak in ways they later learn
Were meaning-fraught.

And yet I am. Could you but wish,
Believe, and touch my hand,
You need not wait till after years
To understand.