The Lone Cypress

A poem that has become a part of my special repository – Invictus

"Invictus" is a short Victorian poem by the English poet William Ernest Henley which he wrote from a hospital bed. It is truly inspiring and knocks sense back in to me each time I stumble.

Here goes:
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

The last two lines of poem, sum it all for me - I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.

Yet why is it that one allows petty thoughts, emotions, difficult and trying situations, to get the better of us?

For if we truly are the masters of our fate, then no one, has the right to clean our slate!