Rai Aren's Blog - Posts Tagged "invictus"

I just saw the movie, Invictus, starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela, and Matt Damon, and I must say it is a tremendous movie - I highly recommend it. Both actors were wonderful in their roles, btw. It is a very inspiring (true) story, one that made my heart swell & my soul stir. In the movie, they shared the poem that gave Mandela hope and strength in his dark days through his long incarceration and I wanted to share it here...

Invictus

"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."

-by William Ernest Henley


I hope it inspires you, too. I find it incredibly moving. I read once, and I agree, that wherever there is oppression, there is already resistance. If Mandela could do what he has done in his lifetime, then truly anything is possible where the human spirit endures and burns bright...

Never let go of your own dreams, my friends...

Rai