The summer of life came on with its heat and its struggle and toil,
Sweat of the brow and the soul, throbbing of muscle and brain,
Toil and moil and grapple with Fortune clutched as she flew—­
Only a shred of her robe, and a brave heart baffled and bowed! 
Stern-visaged Fate with a hand of iron uplifted to fell;
The secret stab of a friend that stung like the sting of an asp,
Wringing red drops from the soul and a stifled moan of despair;
The loose lips of gossip and then—­a storm of slander and lies,
Till Justice was blind as a bat and deaf to the cries of the just,
And Mercy, wrapped up in her robe, stood by like a statue in stone.

Sear autumn followed the summer with frost and the falling of leaves
And red-ripe apples that blushed on the hills in the orchard of peace: 
Red-ripe apples, alas, with worms writhing down to the core,
Apples of ashes and fungus that fell into rot at a touch;
Clusters of grapes in the garden blighted and sour on the vines;
Wheat-fields that waved in the valley and promised a harvest of gold,
Thrashing but chaff and weevil or cockle and shriveled cheat. 
Fair was the promise of spring-time; the harvest a harvest of lies: 
Fair was the promise of summer with Fortune clutched by the robe;
Fair was the promise of autumn—­a hollow harlot in red,
A withered rose at her girdle and the thorns of the rose in her hand.

Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,—­down into the darkness at last;
Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel, sleeping the dreamless sleep—­
Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn—­the pure and the perfect rest: 
Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? 
Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? 
Dead Ashes, what do you care if it storm, if it shine, if it shower? 
Hail-storm, tornado or tempest, or the blinding blizzard of snow,
Or the mid-May showers on the blossoms with the glad sun blinking between,
Dead Ashes, what do you care?—­they break not the sleep of the dead.

Proud stands the ship to the sea, fair breezes belly her sails;
Strong masted, stanch in her shrouds, stanch in her beams and her bones;
Bound for Hesperian isles—­for the isles of the plantain and palm,
Hope walks her deck with a smile and Confidence stands at the helm;
Proudly she turns to the sea and walks like a queen on the waves. 
Caught in the grasp of the tempest, lashed by the fiends of the storm,
Torn into shreds are her sails, tumbled her masts to the main;
Rudderless, rolling she drives and groans in the grasp of the sea;
Harbor or hope there is none; she goes to her grave in the brine: 
Dead in the fathomless slime lie the bones of the ship and her crew. 
Such was the promise of life; so is the promise fulfilled.