Kurit and Other Poems

The Dim Torchlight

I never dreamed, but I dared

To hold the torch and light it;

I never said that I cared

But I let the night be lit;

I thought that it was easy

To spread the beams of torchlight,

So that young people could see

The antidote for twilight;

My clutching fingers held strong

Each had their own aptitude,

But they could not work for long

And with the same altitude;

The torch truly had its weight --

I and they felt the numbing,

Worsened by an empty plate

And our stomach muttering!

This deadened arm found cure

In the cold mediocrity

And in the hot flame (then pure)

Put out by mendacity;

I never thought it would be

A light to help in one's quest

For truth and to make him see

Dimly that we lost the best;

Futile is the torch that glows

Vaguely in this chancy time;

A crag is near, no one knows

Letting one trip is a crime;

The dim torchlight which we hold

Makes the night even darker,

For the promises it told

Whose success is yet yonder.