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I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year
‘Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.’
And he replied,
‘Go into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way!’
* * *
King George VI ended his famous 1939 Christmas message with these words. (Listen here.)
They were written by an unknown poet called Minnie Haskell. She wasn’t credited.
“I read the quotation in a summary of the speech,” she told The Daily Telegraph the following day. “I thought the words sounded familiar and suddenly it dawned on me that they were out of my little book.”
Minnie Haskell published 3 books, none of which were successful. Sadly, even the rest of this poem was not particularly good.
* * *
A lifetime of writing, and you are remembered for 4 lines.
Success or failure?
Success or failure?
* * *
If you are a writer or an artist and say, “failure,” well, you are in trouble.
Because there is something mysterious about art.
Art is the spark
From stoniest flint
That sings
In the dark and cold, I’m light.
The craft can be learned by study and practice, but the spark in art which speaks to other people–that is a gift from God. It cannot be learned or simulated.
And we, ultimately, cannot control whether our work has that spark that will live longer than we do.
All we can do is tell the truth, as beautifully as we can.
* * *
And that is why these four lines, which are all that Minnie Haskell is remembered for, are apt as we enter a new year we cannot control.
‘Go into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way!’