(With thanks to Anjan Ray for the astonishing image in which I found this poem)

If the road ahead is
Mottled, splotched in
Sun and shade; if
The helm you wear was
Once a net of steel
That held out even as
You held on; if
The green that greets
You slides back into grey,
Courage can be the dust
In the slanting ray.

But sometimes the peace
Of the branched tree
Shields your progress
Away from fright.
Promising shelter yet
Ceding ground in
An onslaught of
Unilluminating bright.
Sometimes courage
Is the flight of the bird
Startled out of its darkness
Into the indifferent light.