And how am I to face the odds Of man's bedevilment and God's? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.

A moment's thought would have shown him. But a moment is a long time, and thought is a painful process.

They put arsenic in his meat And stared aghast to watch him eat; They poured strychnine in his cup And shook to see him drink it up.

I, a stranger and afraid, in a world I never made.

Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside, And the bridegroom all night through Never turns him to the bride.

Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.

Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.