I’d toiled the earth twenty-five whole years,
Misfortune and ill luck surely had loved me;
Deafened by fury and soaked in my tears,
I cursed the wretched sky far above me:
“O Cruel World!” said I, “Have you no pity?
Why do you tease me with this worthless life?”
Penniless, I’d been a slave to the city;
Ready for death to resolve all my strife.

At that moment Death Himself descended
And I trembled with unwilling persistence.
“Fear not, your time is not yet expended”
He said, and took me to the borders of existence.
He pointed and said, “look at the space before you—
This is all which and all whom do not exist,
Eternally restless; now, I implore you,
Have you seen such a pitiful sight as this?”

They called out, all of them longing to be
For a moment, in the same world as I;
They plead for the gift beholden to me,
Even to live for a second, and die.
I’ll toil the earth the rest of my days
And who knows how many years?—
But each adversity to come my way
Shall pale in the knowledge that I am here.