The things we love, the loveliest things we cherish,
Pass from us soonest, vanish utterly.
Dust are our deeds, and dust our dreams that perish
Ere we can say they be!
I have loved man and learned we are not brothers —
Within myself, perhaps, may lie the cause;—
Then set one woman high above all others,
And found her full of flaws.
Made unseen stars my keblahs of devotion;
Aspired to knowledge and remained a clod:
With heart and soul, led on by blind emotion,
The way to failure trod.
Chance, say, or fate that works through good and evil;
Or destiny, that nothing may retard,
That to some end, above life's empty level,
Perhaps withholds reward.