thing, since life so often makes us wait,
then gives us nothing, but we are a mulish
species. Stubborn is a human trait.
I save myself in hopes of some great task:
I count my steps, I study deprivation,
I circumscribe even my dreams. I ask
for nothing, yet I hope for my salvation.
Some love is keeping faith. Some faces haunt
us for a lifetime, flouting reasoning
and teaching us humility. To want
what won't be given is a human thing:
to aim at targets we can't even see,
succeed or fail, but never bend the knee.
21 May 1979
