To the Student
Narrow th’ eye becomes reading line ’pon line,
Of books and tomes rife with dead-lettered words,
Rife with lifeless figures and listless signs,
Of knowledge begot without pain transferred,
For what imprints better than the lived life?
What teaches a man more than his sorrow?
What lessons doth he retain free of strife?
Free of the worries of a worse morrow?
Up, schoolboy, up! Put away thy notebooks!
Slip on thy walking shoes and sally forth!
’Fore age and decay blacken thy outlook,
Of life, its grand splendors, and highest worth!
Escape the doldrums of erudition,
And establish fact of what is fiction.
-Q-