INVICTUS

As a young schoolboy, my father told me to memorize and recite William Ernest Henley's poem Invictus and remind myself of it each time I would face adversity and trials. And so I did. He said I would return to it someday and see even more intensely its deeper meaning and the assurance it brings. I have never recited it as often as I have these days. I miss him, but his memory lives in every moment I whisper this poem to myself.

"Out of the night that covers me, black as the pit from pole to pole

I thank whatever gods may be, for my unconquerable soul

in the fell clutch of circumstance, I have not winced nor cried aloud

under the bludgeonings of chance, my head is bloody but unbowed

beyond this place of wrath and tears, looms but the horror of the shade

and yet the menace of the years, finds and shall find me unafraid

it matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll

I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul"