Defiled by darkness and by age, <br />remembering the light of distant youth, <br />he, in the twilight, will not rage <br />that he has failed to find the source of truth, <br />and, though he stumbles, won’t complain <br />he finds no exit from the dark defile, <br />of age, refusing with disdain <br />the proffered succor of a sunny smile, <br />while rejecting beams of light <br />that optimists incurably maintain <br />will surely shine to make things right, <br />till numbed by darkness as by Novocain. <br /> <br />Frank Kermode writes about Edmund Wilson in the New York Times on November 23,1997. He quotes Wilson's courage as he entered 'the dark defile of age'. <br /> <br />1/24/97,2/15/09 <br /><br />gershon hepner<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dark-defile-of-age/
