Classic Poem

What strange-voiced mockery is it which men hear
While strength is with them — while the tireless heart
Fills out the pulses with hale blood, and fear
Finds no abiding in their thoughts? What part
Of man's quick spirit is that sense which knows
Some unseen shape, low-whispering, — like the breath,
Which after summer sunset softly blows —
Keeps always near him — following where he goes,
And, at the last, will lead him down to death?

And when the heart builds hope on hope, and high
On fancy's ladder we have climbed, to gain
Some far-off prize, then that strange voice doth sigh,
As one who sees — and knows, the wish is vain.

Yet if the soul, despairing, wraps the shroud
From faith's dead body round the shuddering clay
And sits alone, in sullen anguish bowed,
That voice will whisper: " Be not grief allowed
To turn to hate — this too shall pass away. "

What then should be or joy or grief, to one
Who sees the end of both — why should we care
To grasp a treacherous dream, or seek to shun
The haunting shadows? For — the day being done —
Fate mocks us — smiling in the twilight there.

But who cares not? The soul will toil and fret,
Racking the heart and patient mind with pain,
Breaking life's hold for what she seeks — and yet,
Perhaps, half-conscious that the quest is vain.

Are glory, greatness, fame, but phantoms then —
Mere pleasing empty sounds? — Can simple trust
And simple love bring to the soul again
Some steadfast hope that will not leave us, when
All else life clings to crumbles into dust?

There must be, somewhere, something that should bless
Each baffled soul which seeks to rise from earth;
Divine, secure in its own loveliness.
No pure unselfish wish should bring distress
Because none sees nor apprehends its worth.

Life hath its battles where no bugle calls
A thousand hearts to brave one common foe;
But where one fights alone, and when he falls
No roll-call tells if he be lost or no,
And how he fought, no record lives to show;
If well or ill — The good he sought to gain,
All other hearts, perhaps, accounted vain,
And when he sinks upon the field and dies,

No line is broken, and no soldier lost.
His dear aims, hidden from all other eyes —
His own dead hand must reckon up the cost
Where none will read; into the grave are tossed,
Himself, his cause, his hopes, and, when he lies
Mixed with the indistinguishable earth, —
No one design fulfilled to speak his worth. —
All is as nothing. — Thus the heedless skies
With summer's rain — with winter's snow and frost
Blot out the graves where monuments should rise.

Yet would we have it other? Who would care
To wage the battle, victory being assured;
No pit-falls in the dark, no deep despair,
No hours of anguish which must be endured?
Who would have others break the path, or spread
A soft and flowering carpet for his feet,
Or walk on velvet — seeing others tread
The wounding shards? Who would not choose defeat

And be content to bear the stinging blows
Of rude misfortune, rather than to win
With smooth prosperity — which well he knows,
Spurns others from the road he travels in?

The finest souls are those that pass away
Like gleams of sunshine from an April hill
Long after — through the summer's regal sway,
And when the autumn's gold hath turned to gray,
The grateful earth will hold their memory still.

These cannot fail forever — they must share
Their being with the earth, and, who can tell —
If here, they fail — mayhap some other where —
When they can fear no more, nor feel despair;
They shall at last make paradise of hell.