Poem by Claude McKay

Futility

Oh, I have tried to laugh the pain away, 
Let new flames brush my love-springs like a feather. 
But the old fever seizes me to-day, 
As sickness grips a soul in wretched weather. 
I have given up myself to every urge, 
With not a care of precious powers spent, 
Have bared my body to the strangest scourge, 
To soothe and deaden my heart’s unhealing rent. 
But you have torn a nerve out of my frame, 
A gut that no physician can replace, 
And reft my life of happiness and aim. 
Oh what new purpose shall I now embrace? 
What substance hold, what lovely form pursue, 
When my thought burns through everything to you?

1. Baptism
2. Dawn in New York
3. The Plateau
4. To One Coming North
5. Spring in New Hampshire

Robert Service Futility ("Dusting my books I spent a busy day")

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