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TROYMy Troy was there, of course,Though people said: Not so.Blind Homer's dead. His ancient myth'sNo way to go. Leave off. Don't dig.But I then rigged some means wherebyTo seam my earthen soul or die.I knew my Troy.Folks warned this boy it was mere taleAnd nothing more.I bore their warning, with a smile,While all the while my spadeWas delving Homer's gardened sun and shade.Gods! Never mind! cried friends: Dumb Homer's blind!How can he show you ruins that n'er were?I'm sure, I said. He speaks. I hear. I'm sure.Their advice spurnedI dug when all their backs were turned,For I had learned when I was eight:Doom was my Fate, they said. The world would end!That day I panicked, thought it true,That you and I and theyWould never see the light of the next day -Yet that day came.With shame I saw it come, recalled my doubtAnd wondered what those Doomsters were about?From that day on I kept a private joy,And did not let them senseMy buried Troy;For if they had, what scorns,Derision, jokes;I sealed my City deepFrom all those folks;And, growing, dug each day. What did I findAnd given as gift by Homer old and Homer blind?One Troy? No, ten!Ten Troys? No, two times ten! Three dozen!And each a richer, finer, brighter cousin!All in my flesh and blood,And each one true.So what's this mean?Go dig the Troy in youGo NOT WITH RUINS IN YOUR MINDGo not with ruins in your mindOr beauty fails; Rome's sun is blindAnd catacomb your cold hotel!Where should-be heavens could-be hell.Beware the temblors and the floodThat time hides fast in tourist's bloodAnd shambles forth from hidden homeAt sight of lost-in-ruins Rome.Think on your joyless blood, take care,Rome's scattered bricks and bones lie thereIn every chromosome and geneLie all that was, or might have been.All architectural tombs and thronesAre tossed to ruin in your bones.Time earthquakes there all life that growsAnd all your future darkness knows,Take not these i

er ruins to Rome,
A sad man wisely stays at home;For if your melancholy goesWhere all is lost, then your loss growsAnd all the dark that self employsWill teem -so travel then with joys.Or else in ruins consummateA death that waited long and late,And all the burning towns of bloodWill shake and fall from sane and good,And you with ruined sight will seeA lost and ruined Rome. And thee?Cracked statue mended by noon's lightYet i

erscaped with soul's midnight.
So go not traveling with moodOr lack of sunlight in your blood,Such traveling has double cost,When you and empire both are lost.When your mind storm-drains catacomb,And all seems graveyard rock in RomeTourist, go not.Stay home.Stay home!I DIE, SO DIES THE WORLDPoor world that does not know its doom, the day I die.Two hundred million pass within my hour of passing,I take this continent with me into the grave.They are most brave, all-i

ocent, and do not know
That if I sink then they are next to go.So in the hour of death the Good Times cheerWhile I, mad egotist, ring in their Bad New Year.The lands beyond my land are vast and bright,Yet I with one sure hand put out their light.I snuff Alaska, doubt Sun King's France, slit Britain's throat,Promote old Mother Russia out of mind with one fell blink,Shove China off a marble quarry brink,Knock far Australia down and place its stone,Kick Japan in my stride. Greece? quickly flown.I'll make it fly and fall, as will green Eire,Turned in my sweating dream, I'll Spain despair,Shoot Goya's children dead, rack Sweden's sons,Crack flowers and farms and towns with sunset guns.When my heart stops, the great Ra drowns in sleep,I bury all the stars in Cosmic Deep.So, listen, world, be warned, know honest dread.When I grow sick, that day your blood is dead.Behave yourself, I'll stick and let you live.But misbehave, I'll take what now I give.That is the end and all. Your flags are furled…If I am shot and dropped? So ends your world.DOING IS BEINGDoing is being.To have done's not enough;To stuff yourself with doing-that's the game.To name yourself each hour by what's done,To tabulate your time at sunset's gunAnd find yourself in actsYou could not know before the factsYou wooed from secret self, which much needs wooing,So doing brings it out,Kills doubt by simply jumping, rushing, ru

ing
Forth to beThe now-discovered me.To not do is to die,Or lie about and lie about the thingsYou just might do some day.Away with that!Tomorrow empty staysIf no man plays it into beingWith his motioned way of seeing.Let your body lead your mindBlood the guide dog to the blind;So then practice and rehearseTo find heart-soul's universe,Knowing that by moving/seeingProves for all time: Doing's being!