I Hold That When A Person Dies His Soul Returns Again To Earth; Arrayed In Some New Flesh-Disguise Another Mother Gives Him Birth. With Sturdier Limbs And Brighter Brain The Old Soul Takes The Road Again. Such Is My Own Belief And Trust; This Hand, This Hand That Holds The Pen, Has Many A Hundred Times Been Dust And Turned, As Dust, To Dust Again; These Eyes Of Mine Have Blinked And Shown In Thebes, In Troy, In Babylon. All That I Rightly Think Or Do, Or Make, Or Spoil, Or Bless, Or Blast, Is Curse Or Blessing Justly Due For Sloth Or Effort In The Past. My Life'S A Statement Of The Sum Of Vice Indulged, Or Overcome. I Know That In My Lives To Be My Sorry Heart Will Ache And Burn, And Worship, Unavailingly, The Woman Whom I Used To Spurn, And Shake To See Another Have The Love I Spurned, The Love She Gave. And I Shall Know, In Angry Words, In Gibes, And Mocks, And Many A Tear, A Carrion Flock Of Homing-Birds, The Gibes And Scorns I Uttered Here. The Brave Word That I Failed To Speak Will Brand Me Dastard On The Cheek. And As I Wander On The Roads I Shall Be Helped And Healed And Blessed; Dear Words Shall Cheer And Be As Goads To Urge To Heights Before Unguessed. My Road Shall Be The Road I Made; All That I Gave Shall Be Repaid. So Shall I Fight, So Shall I Tread, In This Long War Beneath The Stars; So Shall A Glory Wreathe My Head, So Shall I Faint And Show The Scars, Until This Case, This Clogging Mould, Be Smithied All To Kingly Gold.