Delose Connor - Speaks

We had the rare opportunity today to hear Delose Connor speak at church. Delose has been a summer camp director for many, many years. What an amazing meeting for lovers of scouting and our youth. He said so much, but one thing I gleaned from this man was a poem he shared with us about Opportunity. It hit home with the short-comings I find my self equipped with. All of us who feel all we have to contribute to the cause is a blunt, short sword, may feel the strength this poem portrays:

Opportunity

by Edward Rowland Sill

This I beheld, or dreamed it in a dream: —
There spread a cloud of dust along a plain;
And underneath the cloud, or in it, raged
A furious battle, and men yelled, and swords
Shocked upon swords and shields. A prince’s banner
Wavered, then staggered backward, hemmed by foes.

A craven hung along the battle’s edge,
And thought, “Had I a sword of keener steel —
That blue blade that the king’s son bears, — but this
Blunt thing!” — he snapt and flung it from his hand,
And lowering crept away and left the field.

Then came the king’s son, wounded, sore bestead,
And weaponless, and saw the broken sword,
Hilt-buried in the dry and trodden sand,
And ran and snatched it, and with battle-shout
Lifted afresh, he hewed his enemy down,
And saved a great cause that heroic day.