Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WISDOM, by FORD MADOX FORD


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WISDOM, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The young girl questions: 'whether were it better'
Last Line: "nor may till we be dead."
Alternate Author Name(s): Hueffer, Ford Hermann; Hueffer, Ford Madox
Subject(s): Death; Life; Rest; Wisdom; Dead, The


THE young girl questions: "Whether were it better
To lie for ever, a warm slug-a-bed
Or to rise up and bide by Fate and Chance,
The rawness of the morning,
The gibing and the scorning
Of the stern Teacher of my ignorance?"
"I know not," Wisdom said.

The young girl questions: "Friend, shall I die calmer,
If I've lain for ever, sheets above the head,
Warm in a dream, or rise to take the worst
Of peril in the highways
Of straying in the by-ways.
Of hunger for the truth, of drought and thirst?"
"We do not know," he said,
"Nor may till we be dead."





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