My Soul? it's a tame old duck!

I often think of this piece of verse written by the Good Lord knows whom. It's perhaps not a bad reflection for this month of the Holy Souls when we also need to keep an eye on the state of our own.

I think my Soul is a tame old duck

Wallowing around in the farmyard muck,

It's fat and lazy with useless wings

But, once in a while when the North wind sings

And the wild ducks hurtle overhead

It remembers something lost and almost dead,

And it casts a wistful eye

And flaps its wings and tries to fly.

It's fairly content with the state that it's in

But it isn't the duck that it might have been.

                                              Anon