I still must reckon my time to that luckless day
When a ’whelming foe will cross a frontier unguarded
Into this myriad nation of cells that bears my name,
Storming fort after fort till the swarming defenders have perished
And the strangled empire shall fall.
My friends, simple folk, will weep and say, “He is dead!”
But you will smile at their terrible, black-winged angel,
And jot his name and description down in your note-book—
The bitter song of the ages in a line of chemic formula!
Aye, and perchance you can take the components of living,—