Impatience

Vain drug! If I am sick Can others’ sickness heal? Or dead, death make me quick? I care not what they feel.

What reck I? Let me go. Is not my bosom full? The sorrow that I know Makes others’ sorrow dull.

I will shut up the soul, For only joy is just. Stones with the river roll, And we ev’n as we must.

Why should I think of thee, O Wisdom, and thy lies? Better laugh and foolish be Than laugh not and be wise.

The wild-birds heed thee not; Of thee no torrents roar; The deep seas know no jot Of all thy little lore;

But man who cannot ’scape To follow thee and trust, Thou takest by the nape And grindest in the dust.

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