Hear a tale from the field:
A lad in the trenches
Wrote home to the mother
Who taught him to pray,
" Our Father in heaven,"
" God's care has been round me;
This and that one has fallen,
But I am untouched.
Have I not then a right
To be Optimist still? "
And ere the ink dried,
A shot struck him dead.

Wilt thou say then — " Poor fool!
God mocked at his faith,
And confounded his hope,
And the Best is the Worst. "

Ah, friend, who may know
What is Worst, what is Best,
Till he knows all the worlds
In their heights and their depths?
That shot — who can say? —
Was the answer the Best
Gave his faith in the Best,
Could our eyes only follow him
World after world,
On, on, and still on!