While I was serving my mission in Kentucky, I had a companion who introduced me to "Invictus", a poem by William Ernest Henley. My mission companion had it memorized. He gave me a small copy of it, and which I ended up memorizing it.
I think of memorizing poetry is like memorizing a scripture or a hymn, and not only to know it or have it scripted, but because memorizing things is fun.
Out of the night that covers me,
Black is the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud,
Under the bludgeoning of chance,
My head is bloody but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how straight the gate,
How charged the punishment the scroll
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul.
I really like the last two lines, it's almost like an allusion to a ship
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting with that allusion isn't it? There was actually an LDS poem that was written as a response to this. I don't remember the title of it, or the author, but the poem, more or less, was a rebuke to "Invictus" for the last two lines, submitting that Christ is the captain of our souls.
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