HE ARGUES WITH HIS LIFE <br />My life, what strange mad garments hast thou on, <br />Now that I see thee truly and am wise! <br />Thou wild, lost Proteus, strangling and undone! <br />What shapes are these, what metamorphoses <br />Of a god's soul in pain? I hear thy cries <br />And see thee writhe and take fantastic forms, <br />And strike in blindness at the destinies <br />And at thyself, and at thy brother worms. <br />Ah, foolish worm, thou canst not change thy lot, <br />And all like thee must perish 'neath the sun. <br />Why struggle with thy fellows? Nay, be kind, <br />Kinder than these. Behold, the flower--pot <br />Of fate is emptied out, and one by one <br />The fisher takes you, and his hooks are blind.<br /><br />Wilfrid Scawen Blunt<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-love-sonnets-of-proteus-part-i-to-manon-xvi/
