TESTAMENT

I SAID, “I will take my life

And throw it away;

I who was fire and song

Will turn to clay.”

“I will lie no more in the night

With shaken breath,

I will toss my heart in the air

To be caught by Death.”

But out of the night I heard,

Like the inland sound of the sea,

The hushed and terrible sob

Of all humanity.

Then I said, “Oh who am I

To scorn God to his face?

I will bow my head and stay

And suffer with my race.”