Carlyle McIntyre

From “On the Road”

MY latch was lifted—a tall light crept in.

His wings were bleeding and his feet were sore,

His eyes were vacant as a wind-swept moor:

Most pitiful of glorious cherubim.

I fed him, as I thought an angel must

Be weary from a way so long and hard;

I bathed his feet and balmed his wings with nard,

Then sat before him, nibbling my poor crust.

“Oh, are you Death?” I asked him.—“I am Faith.”

“Then shall I be exalted?” “Nay, brought low.”

“What shall I have”—for he had risen to go—

“To prove I have not succored a fell wraith?”

“You shall have doubt and bitterness,” he said.

And hence it is that I am worse than dead.