YE cannot cheat the Master of your fate!
Proclaim the goal to which your feet are set,
He who knows all is the Compassionate,
Often His wisdom prompts Him to forget.
❧
WHY weep for days irrevocably dead,
For flaunting hopes in envious battle slain?
The bravest soldier frankly looks ahead,
Knowing he dare not fight the past again.
❧
TO-NIGHT old poets through the city go,
Doors shake and windows rattle at their tread,
The empty streets are noisy with the woe
Of sad immortals banished to the dead.
❧
THE future lies before us rich with gold,
Only the foolish backward gaze and fret:
What laughter lurks in stories still untold,
What solemn songs await the singer yet!
PERCY HEMINGWAY.
MLA citation:
Hemingway, Percy. “Four Quatrains.” The Pageant, 1896, p. 130. Pageant Digital Edition, edited by Frederick King and Lorraine Janzen Kooistra, 2019-2021. Yellow Nineties 2.0, Ryerson University Centre for Digital Humanities, 2021. https://1890s.ca/pag1-hemingway-fourquatrains/