Time's finger on the dial of my life
Points to high noon! and yet the
half-spent day
Leaves less than half remaining,
for the dark,
Bleak shadows of the grave engulf
the end.
To those who burn the candle to the
stick,
The sputtering socket yields but
little light.
Long life is sadder than an early
death.
We cannot count on raveled threads
of age
Whereof to weave a fabric. We must
use
The warp and woof the ready present
yields
And toil while daylight lasts. When
I bethink
How brief the past, the future,
still more brief
Calls on to action, action! Not
for me
Is time for retrospection or for
dreams,
Not time for self-laudation or remorse.
Have I done nobly? Then I must not
let
Dead yesterday unborn to-morrow
shame.
Have I done wrong? Well, let the
bitter taste
Of fruit that turned to ashes on
my lip
Be my reminder in temptation's hour,
And keep me silent when I would
condemn.
Sometimes it takes the acid of a
sin
To cleanse the clouded windows of
our souls
So pity may shine through them.
Looking back,
My faults and errors seem like stepping-stones
That led the way to knowledge of
the truth
And made me value virtue; sorrows
shine
In rainbow colors o'er the gulf
of years,
Where lie forgotten pleasures.
Looking forth,
Out to the western sky still bright
with noon,
I feel well spurred and booted for
the strife
That ends not till Nirvana is attained.
Battling with fate, with men and
with myself,
Up the steep summit of my life's
forenoon,
Three things I learned, three things
of precious worth,
To guide and help me down the western
slope.
I have learned how to pray, and
toil, and save:
To pray for courage to receive what
comes,
Knowing what comes to be divinely
sent;
To toil for universal good, since
thus
And only thus can good come unto
me;
To save, by giving whatsoe'er I
have
To those who have not--this alone
is gain.
Poems of Power by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Chicago : W. B. Conkey, 1902.
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