I know not in Whose hands are laid <br />To empty upon earth <br />From unsuspected ambuscade <br />The very Urns of Mirth; <br /> <br />Who bids the Heavenly Lark arise <br />And cheer our solemn round-- <br />The Jest beheld with streaming eyes <br />And grovellings on the ground; <br /> <br />Who joins the flats of Time and Chance <br />Behind the prey preferred, <br />And thrones on Shrieking Circumstance <br />The Sacredly Absurd, <br /> <br />Till Laughter, voiceless through excess, <br />Waves mute appeal and sore, <br />Above the midriff's deep distress, <br />For breath to laugh once more. <br /> <br />No creed hath dared to hail Him Lord, <br />No raptured choirs proclaim, <br />And Nature's strenuous Overword <br />Hath nowhere breathed His Name. <br /> <br />Yet, it must be, on wayside jape, <br />The selfsame Power bestows <br />The selfsame power as went to shape <br />His Planet or His Rose.<br /><br />Rudyard Kipling<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-necessitarian/
