Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right, Because their words had forked no lightning they Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay, Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight, And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way, Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay, Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height, Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray. Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
This is like my go to poem for when I need to remind myself that even if we completely eat shit, it's still worth fighting. Yeah, we'll probably lose, yeah, the odds are really bad, but fuck it. I didn't spend forty years dragging this decaying corpse in to the future one second at a time just to give up now because things look bad. I'm gonna fight because I want to fight, because good things are possible even if they don't happen in my time, and because it gives me something to do while I wait for death's gentle embrace.
It’s a great one! We must not tolerate the intolerable and struggle itself has value.
Another source of poetic comfort for me has been the first 3 lines of “The Second Coming”:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Things are escalating, the systems of control are in decaying at an escalating rate, things are going to happen.