Poets and Dreamers - Lady Gregory - Bog

'I am in age, and my shape is withered; many a day I have been going astray.... When I was young, my deeds were evil; I delighted greatly in quarrels and rows. I liked much better to be playing or drinking on a Sunday morning than to be going to Mass.... I was given to great oaths, and I did not let lust or drunkenness pass me by.... The day has stolen away, and I have not raised the hedge until the crop in which Thou didst take delight is destroyed.... I am a worthless stake in a corner of a hedge, or I am like a boat that has lost its rudder, that would he broken against a rock in the sea, and that would be drowned in the cold waves.'