summary of poem courage courage courage by Edgar guest
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When you falter and slip, and it isn't your day,
And your best doesn't measure to what is required,
When you know in your heart that you're fast growing tired,
With the odds all against you, there's one thing to do:
That is, call on your courage and see the thing through.
Who battles for victory ventures defeat.
Misfortune is something we all have to meet ;
Take the loss with the grace you would take in the gain.
When things go against you, don't whine or complain;
Just call on your courage and grin if you can.
Though you fail to succeed, do not fail as a man.
There are dark days and stormy, which come to us all,
When about us in ruin our hopes seem to fall.
But stand to whatever you happen to meet—
We must all drink the bitter as well as the sweet.
And the test of your courage is: What do you do
In the hour when reverses are coming to you.
Never changed is the battle by curse or regret,
Though you whimper and whine, still the end must be met
And who fights a good fight, though he struggle in vain,
Shall have many a vict'ry to pay for his pain.
So take your reverses as part of the plan
Which God has devised for creating a man.
by Edgar Albert Guest
Edgar Albert Guest elaborates that courage is not temporary and not a mere flash of reflection and is not like a lighting that flashes and goes off. He explains that courage is long lasting and always remains. It leaves deep and lasting impression and always works in the background and keeps reflecting itself. It stays with the person in every moment, situation, and throughout the life in one way or the other. It holds back the person whether he calls for it or not. The courage always drops in and reflects itself when the person is facing a tough time, slipping down, and situations go against the run. The poet says one who wants to win has to definitely explore misfortune, failures, and mishaps.
The poet emphasizes how one needs to take any sort of failures positively and graciously in the spree of efforts and success. How one should call for and hold on to courage in the tough time. One has to confront and suffer the dark during negative days in life for sure and has to bear the unfortunate losses and they act to ruin the hopes of the man but one should face and stand up to whatever comes in front him and should face it. The true time to test one's courage is when you are facing a rough time.
Bitter works as the counter-part of sweet to achieve the goals and the good one has to be prepared for failures and falls. Cursing or regretting or falling out and crying over the miss-outs or failures is of no help in winning the goals and they have to be rather patiently accepted and the achievements would then be the apt rewards of the pain one suffers through the journey.
So, a man should work and act opposite to the hardships and fall outs to fill in the perfect plan that the god has kept for him as god helps those who help themselves.