On a Grey Thread/Life's Leaders
Life's Leaders
Their clouded wine, their whited bread,We cannot take and call it good;Yet sorrier fare Life grudges usWho have no taste for common food.
We must go hungry long life through,Aching and hungry to the end;Betrayed by pity into chainsReason tries vainly to transcend.
Are we not sadly prodigal?We spend ourselves without restraint;Yea, we let Beauty break our heartsAnd bleed for love until we faint.
Yet it is not the thorns, the shame,Not the hurt body's weak distress:Our bitterest crucifixion liesIn man's abject unworthiness.
From Life's rough cloth and flying threads,From dust, from passion, dreams and pain,From the dear madness men call love,From faith that lies beyond the brain,
We shape the only deathless soulThat mortal man will ever know.Behold his gratitude, these stones.They say 't is by the heart we grow.
Still we build quietly and wait.The heart may break; the heart is frail;But a stern, strange ecstasyBefriends us; and we dare not fail.
The Hand that points the solemn wayMay be a wanton hand at best;The great Word echoing in our soulsMay be a bored God's casual jest.
We cannot guess. We only know'T is written by some awful PenWe must be torches sacrificedTo light the way for lesser men.