Resignation

This item of juvenilia from Clark Ashton Smith (CAS) is no great poetry, but interesting when the author's youth is taken into consideration:


Whate'er may be my destined lot or fate,
Whate'er the future life, I calmly wait;
What use to fret or fear--the end of man
Unchanging is, and cometh soon or late!


The title "Resignation" certainly captures the sentiment expressed in those lines, and represents a more fatalistic outlook than one typically expects from a teenager, although perhaps my own advancing years have simply distanced me from what it was like to be that age!

Having now read a generous sampling of CAS' mature poetry, I find it notable that even at a young age he could express such an acquiescent viewpoint, and apparently maintain it well into his adult years.