THE GLORY, JEST AND RIDDLE


From all of Earth’s long history, it’s we
Who have emerged to be its foremost race,
Its most complex and capable, who see
By mind as well as eyes into a space
Beyond the here and now, whose intellect
Avails itself of memory and speech
And keen technologies that can inspect
The universe at large by their far reach.
And yet it’s we, for all that sight of mind,
That wondrous gift of looking fore and aft,
Who often prove in moral matters blind
And, in our willful pride and anger, daft.
That we are such is our perversity.
Is there no cure for mulish misery?

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"Would you like to swing on a star,
Carry moonbeams home in a jar,
Be better off than you are,
Or would you rather be a mule?"

—Bing Crosby

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