Poem by Arthur Henry Adams

The Weakling

I AM a weakling. God, who made 
 The still, strong man, made also me.
   The God who could the tiger plan,
In his lithe splendour unafraid— 
 A thing of flame and poetry— 
   That Puissance made of me—a Man! 
 
The One who reared His vast design— 
 Star, atom, system, germ, and soul— 
   Could fashion forth this tremulous 
And paltry little heart of mine! 
 The God who could conceive the Whole,
   Himself blasphemed in building thus.

When I dare look the glass within, 
 The ‘Mene Tekel’ mark I see. 
   God made this slinking, stunted thing, 
This narrowed face, this futile chin, 
 Prisoned a soul deliberately 
   ’Neath these blunt nerves unanswering? 
 
I see my fellows strong and proud, 
 Lustful and splendid with desires, 
   Secure and strenuous within, 
God opulently them endowed,
 And lit in them immortal fires;
   And left me scarcely strength to sin. 
 
I watch them triumph by, afar, 
 Crashing through life with crude disdain.
   Theirs is a universe so wide, 
So keen and rich the colours are 
 That reach each fine responsive brain. 
   They are the bridegrooms, Life the bride! 
 
They carry in their veins their fate; 
 Foredoomed are they to victory. 
   Their broad brows are a diadem 
Of mastery; they but await 
 Their long determined destiny, 
   For at their birth Life laurelled them. 

They have their chance to win, to fall— 
 The fighting chance, the deathless hope; 
   Their fate they venture to assail; 
They chafe for ever at their thrall; 
 They dare with their despair to cope, 
   Superbly strive, superbly fail. 
 
But I starve with a stunted brain: 
 My vision is so mean and scant 
   That every hue it blurs and dulls. 
God branded me—this brow of Cain!— 
 Put in me this heart hesitant, 
   And lamed me with a limping pulse. 
 
I watch them striding on; they flout 
 Death even; then my path I see: 
   The narrow path—the narrow curse. 
Ah, wonder, if I dare to doubt 
 If sin of mine prescribed for me 
   This mean and niggard universe? 
 
The end that is upon my face 
 And in my wizened soul I wait— 
   The end that I shall count for good.
Yet they who pass me in the race 
 Left me to falter to my fate: 
   They did not slay me when they should.
 
But yet He found ‘that it was good’.
 Ah! surely in the soul of God 
   For me some kindly pity is? 
Or else I wonder how He could 
 Raise me—a soul—up from the sod,
   Lift me from Nothingness—to this! 
 
Yet—thin weak lips and woman-chin— 
 Some unknown debt to me is paid, 
   Some sacrifice I may not see. 
I expiate some other’s sin. 
 I am God’s weakling. He who made 
   The still, strong man, made also me.

1. On the Sands
2. Fleet Street
3. Bereft
4. Civilization
5. Written in Australia

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