The Mockery of Life
The Mockery of Life
Original Text
Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, "The Love Sonnets of Proteus," "Part III. -- Gods and False Gods," LXXIV-LXXVI, Poems (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1923): 74-75. PR 4149 B8A17
1God! What a mockery is this life of ours!
2Cast forth in blood and pain from our mother's womb,
3Most like an excrement, and weeping showers
4Of senseless tears: unreasoning, naked, dumb,
5The symbol of all weakness and the sum:
6Our very life a sufferance. -- Presently,
7Grown stronger, we must fight for standing-room
8Upon the earth, and the bare liberty
9To breathe and move. We crave the right to toil.
10We push, we strive, we jostle with the rest.
11We learn new courage, stifle our old fears,
12Stand with stiff backs, take part in every broil.
13It may be that we love, that we are blest.
14It may be, for a little space of years,
15We conquer fate and half forget our tears.
16And then fate strikes us. First our joys decay.
17Youth, with its pleasures, is a tale soon told.
18We grow a little poorer day by day.
19Old friendships falter. Loves grow strangely cold.
20In vain we shift our hearts to a new hold
21And barter joy for joy, the less for less.
22We doubt our strength, our wisdom, and our gold.
23We stand alone, as in a wilderness
24Of doubts and terrors. Then, if we be wise,
25We make our terms with fate and, while we may,
26Sell our life's last sad remnant for a hope.
27And it is wisdom thus to close our eyes.
28But for the foolish, those who cannot pray,
29What else remains of their dark horoscope
30But a tall tree and courage and a rope?
31And who shall tell what ignominy death
32Has yet in store for us; what abject fears
33Even for the best of us; what fights for breath;
34What sobs, what supplications, what wild tears;
35What impotence of soul against despairs
36Which blot out reason? -- The last trembling thought
37Of each poor brain, as dissolution nears,
38Is not of fair life lost, of Heaven bought
39And glory won. 'Tis not the thought of grief;
40Of friends deserted; loving hearts which bleed;
41Wives, sisters, children who around us weep.
42But only a mad clutching for relief
43From physical pain, importunate Nature's need;
44The search as for a womb where we may creep
45Back from the world, to hide, -- perhaps to sleep.
Publication Start Year
1881
Publication Notes
"The Mockery of Life, A Triple Sonnet," The Love Songs of Proteus (London: Kegan Paul, 1881): 79-81. PR 4149 B8L6 1881 Robarts Library
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2005
Rhyme
Form