WHEN step by step fate beats me farther back Until I stand upon the ultimate, It is not will nor instrument I lack To put myself beyond the spoils of fate; Nor duty to a Maker that made ill, Nor judgment from the lips of living men, Nor end of what I only might fulfil, Nor pain of endless doom arrests me then. I hold my sword because, the chasm past, I fear the encounter with those mighty dead That made each bloody slope unto the last A pasture-land where climbing flocks are fed. I fear lest they come, vast and justified, With mute, appraising eyes, -- and turn aside. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...GOAL by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON SHE WEEPS OVER RAHOON by JAMES JOYCE DOMEDAY BOOK: JOHN CAMPBELL AND CARL EATON by EDGAR LEE MASTERS DEATH SNIPS PROUD MEN by CARL SANDBURG MOTHER EARTH by GEORGE SANTAYANA HYBRIDS OF WAR: A MORALITY POEM: 4. THE MORAL by KAREN SWENSON |