Arlo Will by Edgar Lee Masters — Read

Did you ever see an alligator / Come up to the air from the mud, / Staring blindly under the full glare of noon?

Have you seen the stabled horses at night / Tremble and start back at the sight of a lantern?

Have you ever walked in darkness / When an unknown door was open before you / And you stood, it seemed, in the light of a thousand candles / Of delicate wax?

Have you walked with the wind in your ears / And the sunlight about you / And found it suddenly shine with an inner splendor?

Out of the mud many times, / Before many doors of light / Through many fields of splendor, / Where around your steps a soundless glory scatters / Like new-fallen snow, / Will you go through earth, O strong of soul, / And through unnumbered heavens / To the final flame!