The Tangled Skein

TRY we life-long, we can neverStraighten out life's tangled skein,Why should we, in vain endeavour,Guess and guess and guess again?Life's a pudding full of plums;Care's a canker that benumbs.Wherefore waste our elocutionOn impossible solution?Life's a pleasant institution,Let us take it as it comes!

Set aside the dull enigma,We shall guess it all too soon;Failure brings no kind of stigma—Dance we to another tune!String the lyre and fill the cup,Lest on sorrow we should sup.

Hop and skip to Fancy's fiddle,Hands across and down the middle—Life's perhaps the only riddleThat we shrink from giving up!