Maktoob

A shell surprised our post one day      And killed a comrade at my side.     My heart was sick to see the way         He suffered as he died.     I dug about the place he fell,      And found, no bigger than my thumb,     A fragment of the splintered shell         In warm aluminum.     I melted it, and made a mould,      And poured it in the opening,     And worked it, when the cast was cold,         Into a shapely ring.     And when my ring was smooth and bright,      Holding it on a rounded stick,     For seal, I bade a Turco write         'Maktoob' in Arabic.     'Maktoob!' "'Tis written!" . . . So they think,      These children of the desert, who     From its immense expanses drink         Some of its grandeur too.     Within the book of Destiny,      Whose leaves are time, whose cover, space,     The day when you shall cease to be,         The hour, the mode, the place,     Are marked, they say; and you shall not      By taking thought or using wit     Alter that certain fate one jot,         Postpone or conjure it.     Learn to drive fear, then, from your heart.      If you must perish, know, O man,     'Tis an inevitable part         Of the predestined plan.     And, seeing that through the ebon door      Once only you may pass, and meet     Of those that have gone through before         The mighty, the elite - -     Guard that not bowed nor blanched with fear      You enter, but serene, erect,     As you would wish most to appear         To those you most respect.     So die as though your funeral      Ushered you through the doors that led     Into a stately banquet hall         Where heroes banqueted;     And it shall all depend therein      Whether you come as slave or lord,     If they acclaim you as their kin         Or spurn you from their board.     So, when the order comes: "Attack!"      And the assaulting wave deploys,     And the heart trembles to look back         On life and all its joys;     Or in a ditch that they seem near      To find, and round your shallow trough     Drop the big shells that you can hear         Coming a half mile off;     When, not to hear, some try to talk,      And some to clean their guns, or sing,     And some dig deeper in the chalk -         I look upon my ring:     And nerves relax that were most tense,      And Death comes whistling down unheard,     As I consider all the sense         Held in that mystic word.     And it brings, quieting like balm      My heart whose flutterings have ceased,     The resignation and the calm         And wisdom of the East.