I have done at length with dreaming;
Henceforth, O thou soul of mine!
Thou must take up sword and buckler,
Waging warfare most divine.
Life is struggle, combat, victory!
Wherefore have I slumbered on
With my forces all unmarshaled,
With my weapons all undrawn?
O how many a glorious record
Had the angels of me kept
Had I done instead of doubted,
Had I warred instead of wept!
But begone, regret, bewailing!
Ye had weakened at the best;
I have tried the trusty weapons
Resting erst within my breast.
I have wakened to my duty,
To a knowledge strong and deep,
That I recked not of aforetime,
In my long inglorious sleep.
For the end of life is service,
And I felt it not before,
And I dreamed not how stupendous
Was the meaning that it bore.
In this subtle sense of being,
Newly stirred in every vein,
I can feel a throb electric--
Pleasure half allied with pain.
'Tis so sweet, and yet so awful,
So bewildering, yet brave,
To be king in every conflict
Where before I crouched a slave!
'Tis so glorious to be conscious
Of a growing power within
Stronger than the rallying forces
Of a charged and marshaled sin!
Never in those old romances
Felt I half the thrill of life
That I feel within me stirring,
Standing in this place of strife.
O those olden days of dalliance,
When I wantoned with my fate;
When I trifled with the knowledge
That had well-nigh come too late.
Yet, my soul, look not behind thee;
Thou hast work to do at last;
Let the brave toil of the present
Overarch the crumbling past.
Build thy great acts high and higher;
Build them on the conquered sod
Where thy weakness first fell bleeding,
And thy first prayer rose to God.
--Caroline Atherton Mason.