For a Fatalist
Life ushers some as heirs-elect To weather wind and gale; Here lies a man whose ships were wrecked Ere he could hoist a sail.
Countee Cullen
Life ushers some as heirs-elect To weather wind and gale; Here lies a man whose ships were wrecked Ere he could hoist a sail.
The speaker is standing before a grave, summing up a life in four tight lines. Some people, the poem says, are born into favor—life makes them heirs and gives them the strength to survive storms. But the man buried here never got that chance.
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