Invictus
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
~ William Ernest Henley
Stoic Henley suffered bone tuberculosis and had to have most of his leg amputated aged 17 but wrote ^ this in 1875 to defy melancholy and encourage determination within himself. What a dude.
Credit for introducing me to this poem goes to
Front magazine, by the way (if you're reading this at work, be warned that if you click the link for the mag there will be bare boobies, ohnoes!) as model Emily has the final verse tattooed on her arm which is kinda cool.
