Ay, the Life and the Death are her words to us here, Of one significance, pricking the blind. This is thy gain now the surface is clear: To read with a soul in the mirror of mind Is man’s chief lesson.—Thou smilest! I preach! Acid smiling, my friend, reveals Abysses within; frigid preaching a street Paved unconcernedly smooth For the lecturer straight on his heels, Up and down a policeman’s beat; Bearing tonics not labelled to soothe. Thou hast a disgust of the sermon in rhyme. It is not attractive in being too chaste. The popular tale of adventure and crime Would equally sicken an overdone taste. So, then, onward. Philosophy, thoughtless to soothe, Lifts, if thou wilt, or there leaves thee supine. Thy condition, good sooth, has no seeming of sweet; It walks our first crags, it is flint for the tooth, For the thirsts of our nature brine. But manful has met it, manful will meet. And think of thy privilege: supple with youth, To have sight of the headlong swine, Once fouling thee, jumping the dips! As the coin of thy purse poured out: An animal’s holiday past: And free of them thou, to begin a new bout; To start a fresh hunt on a resolute blast: No more an imp-ridden to bournes of eclipse: Having knowledge to spur thee, a gift to compare; Rubbing shoulder to shoulder, as only the book Of the world can be read, by necessity urged. For witness, what blinkers are they who look From the state of the prince or the millionnaire! They see but the fish they attract, The hungers on them converged; And never the thought in the shell of the act, Nor ever life’s fangless mirth. But first, that the poisonous of thee be purged, Go into thyself, strike Earth. She is there, she is felt in a blow struck hard. Thou findest a pugilist countering quick, Cunning at drives where thy shutters are barred; Not, after the studied professional trick, Blue-sealing; she brightens the sight. Strike Earth, Antaeus, young giant, whom fortune trips! And thou com’st on a saving fact, To nourish thy planted worth. Be it clay, flint, mud, or the rubble of chips, Thy roots have grasp in the stern-exact: The redemption of sinners deluded! the last Dry handful, that bruises and saves. To the common big heart are we bound right fast, When our Mother admonishing nips At the nakedness bare of a clout, And we crave what the commonest craves.