| Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917. |
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| 214. What am I, Life? |
| | | By John Masefield |
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| WHAT am I, Life? A thing of watery halt | |
| Held in cohesion by unresting cells, | |
| Which work they know not why, which never halt, | |
| Myself unwitting where their Master dwells | |
| I do not bid them, yet they toil, they spin | 5 |
| A world which uses me as I use them; | |
| Nor do I know which end or which begin | |
| Nor which to praise, which pamper, which condemn. | |
| So, like a marvel in a marvel set, | |
| I answer to the vast, as wave by wave | 10 |
| The sea of air goes over, dry or wet, | |
| Or the full moon comes swimming from her cave, | |
| Or the great sun comes forth: this myriad I | |
| Tingles, not knowing how, yet wondering why. | |
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