Defiled by darkness and by age,
remembering the light of distant youth,
he, in the twilight, will not rage
that he has failed to find the source of truth,
and, though he stumbles, won’t complain
he finds no exit from the dark defile,
of age, refusing with disdain
the proffered succor of a sunny smile,
while rejecting beams of light
that optimists incurably maintain
will surely shine to make things right,
till numbed by darkness as by Novocain.

Frank Kermode writes about Edmund Wilson in the New York Times on November 23,1997. He quotes Wilson's courage as he entered 'the dark defile of age'.

1/24/97,2/15/09

gershon hepner

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dark-defile-of-age/