A New Pilgrimage: Sonnet XXV

And what brave life it was we lived that tide,
Lived, or essayed to live--for who shall say
Youth garners aught but its own dreams denied,
Or handles what it hoped for yesterday?
High prophets were we of the uncultured lay,
Supremely scorning all that to our pride
Seemed less than truth. Be truth the thing it may,
Our Goddess she, deformed but deified.
Prophets and poets of the Earth's last birth
Revealed in ugliness, a blind despair,
Only that we were young and of such worth
As still can thrive upon life's leanest fare,
And find in the world's turmoil its full quittance
Of joy denied, however poor the pittance.