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 or 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 is the scroll,
I am the master of my fate
I am the captain of my soul.
(William Ernest Henley, Invictus)