Commend the Day

How meaningless our lives would seem to be

If we paused to contemplate, perhaps repent

The countless infidelities of mind,

How we betrayed our bodies and our souls,

Our misspent youth and trysts of later years.

Regret like a cross would hang upon our backs

And towards some distant emptiness we'd stare.

The needs we deemed essential and unique

Our woes, our wants, inconsequential things,

Our grief a canker that feeds on the roots of life.

Though sorrow's tears can overflow the seas

Never can they move the gods of fate.

As a vase is shattered and the pieces fall

So with our fractured lives unless we find

Concealed against the facile outer view

The intimate Supreme felicity

Who sits within yet still cannot be seen

Except we wake to hear the voice supreme,

Commend the day and abrogate the night.