Here is the poem in full.
Invictus
William Ernest Henley - 1849-1903
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
At this time, when we may miss the sound of the human voice, I thought to share another set of recordings with you.
Over the weekend, students from NUS translated some messages which doctors on the ground needed to communicate to workers in five languages – Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, Myanmar, and Chinese. Their voices reached 25,000 workers in dormitories.
The requests came in from doctors on the ground, and the students responded within minutes – in text and voice recordings. They have also signed up to be "live translators" when specific conversations are needed. Of course, machines and software can translate – but there is nothing like the sound of a human voice.
The students did all this, with the stress from impending exams and uncertainties about the pandemic, and asked: “What else do you need?”
We have 40 more days in the wilderness.
At a time of fear and anxiety, there are many among us who cast our eyes down, and ask, why? Then there are the few, like these students, who speak to all who need to hear, who look beyond themselves and ask, why not?