how broad the shoulder

[fledgist]

no one can bear a burden for all of life
the weight must sink one or be cast off
before the mind falls into a deep trough
or disaster strike with its heavy knife
avoidance of all struggle and all strife
escape from that most dreadful slough
neither of these is in itself enough
to justify how humans man or wife
or child or singleton or those otherwise
may through their living act or signify
what purpose gives the fact of life its fire
seen through normal not-quite-clear eyes
the art of living's just another lie
we tell ourselves before the final pyre