Memorizing Mondays: Invictus

William Ernest Henley

Memorizing things is fun.  Back in the day I used to memorize tons of Bible stuff, even packing down an entire epistle once.  It’s a great way to keep the brain in shape, look awesome in front of friends and carry beautiful things around in your head.

I am resolving to memorize a bit of awesome every week.  Last week’s awesome was William Ernest Henley’s poem, ‘Invictus.’

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.

This week I’ll either memorize ‘If-‘ by Rudyard Kipling, ‘Ozymandias’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley or the soliloquy from Act 3, Scene 1 of Hamlet (To be or not to be…).

What awesome things have you memorized and which ones should I add to my list?