Despair
I can laugh now.
Have you not heard my laughter?
It leads the winds:
They come tumbling and bubbling after.
I have learned to laugh.
I have learned to laugh with my spirit
And with my soul.
Listen. Do you not hear it?
I shall quench the world.
I shall sear the stars with my laughter;
Shrivel the moon and the sun
And make new ones after.
For life’s skeleton
I shall make flesh from desires;
Then of my mounting laughter
Build it a temple with mocking spires.
I shall laugh to heaven.
I shall laugh below hell and above.
I shall laugh forever.
It was laughter God died of.
From On a Grey Thread (Will Ransom, 1923) by Elsa Gidlow. This poem is in the public domain.