And so I went away, and while I went I was thinking, far down in my soul.
And I said: "It must be everything or nothing; either I am a poet or I am
not. I will act as if I were; I will burn my bridges behind me. If I am, I
will win--for you can not kill a poet; and if I am not, I will die."

Thus is it perilous.

I fight the fight with all my soul; I give every ounce of my strength, my
will, my hope, to the making of myself a poet. And when the time comes I
write my poem. Then if I win, I win empires; and if I lose--

"You put all your eggs into one basket," some one once said to me.

"Yes," I replied, "I put all my eggs into one basket--and then I carry the
basket myself."

Now I have come to the last stage of the journey--the "one fight more, and
the last." And can I give any idea of what is back of me, to nerve me to
that fight? I will try to tell you.

For seven years I have borne poverty and meanness, sickness, heat,
cold, toil--that I might make myself an artist. The indignities, the
degradations--I could not tell them, if I spent all the time I have in
writing a journal. I have lived in garrets--among dirty people--vulgar
people--vile people; I have worn rags and unclean things; I have lived upon
bread and water and things that I have cooked myself; I have seen my time
and my strength wasted by a thousand hateful impertinences--I have been
driven half mad with pain and rage; I have gone without friends--I have
been hated by every one; I have worked at all kinds of vile drudgery--or
starved myself sick that I might avoid working.