I'd rather

To be a soldier is dangerous,

and studies are very cumbersome;

poetry is sweet and delicate,

but poets are too quaint

in these wild times.

I would rather be in the cavalry,

a good sword at my side,

a lute in my right hand,

and a student's heart for the fight.

Life is a wild charger

with flashing hoofs:

he who dares honestly will subjugate it,

and where it treads, its hoofs ring out!