Jessie B. Rittenhouse, ed. (18691948). The Little Book of Modern Verse. 1917. |
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140. I Would I Might Forget That I Am I |
| By George Santayana |
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I WOULD I might forget that I am I, | |
And break the heavy chain that binds me fast, | |
Whose links about myself my deeds have cast. | |
What in the bodys tomb doth buried lie | |
Is boundless; t is the spirit of the sky, | 5 |
Lord of the future, guardian of the past, | |
And soon must forth, to know his own at last. | |
In his large life to live, I fain would die. | |
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Happy the dumb beast, hungering for food, | |
But calling not his suffering his own; | 10 |
Blessèd the angel, gazing on all good, | |
But knowing not he sits upon a throne; | |
Wretched the mortal, pondering his mood, | |
And doomed to know his aching heart alone. | |
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