This block is taking longer to resolve than I hoped. Here’s a sonnet in the meantime:
In soaring through the world, from rest to rest,
Emergent to recumbent, dust would claim
The briefest spark, the right to take a name
And drink of life while life shall lend a breast—
But when what we imbibe does not digest,
And turns not into pleasure, nor to fame,
But curdles, lying heavy, who would claim
There’s aught to favor in that draught distressed?
Now from the cream let’s separate the jest,
Dyspeptic humor none should stomach, lest
We take it to the heart and cast our blame,
Unheeded, on the teat. Were time repressed,
We’d still endure this sharpest sort of test,
To either lose our ground, or find the flame.
Botaram vita est.