I’m posting this tonight for Joe.

THE RIGHT THING

Let others probe the mystery if they can.

Time-harried prisoners of Shall and Will-

The right thing happens to the happy man.

The bird flies out, the bird flies back again;

The hill becomes the valley, and is still;

Let others delve that mystery if they can.

God bless the roots! -Body and soul are one

The small become the great, the great the small;

The right thing happens to the happy man.

Child of the dark, he can out leap the sun,

His being single, and that being all:

The right thing happens to the happy man.

Or he sits still, a solid figure when

The self-destructive shake the common wall;

Takes to himself what mystery he can,

And, praising change as the slow night comes on,

Wills what he would, surrendering his will

Till mystery is no more: No more he can.

The right thing happens to the happy man.

~Theodore Roethke