Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. V. Browning to Rupert Brooke
William Ernest Henley (18491903)I. M.R. T. Hamilton Bruce
(1846–99)
O
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.