I keep getting a lot of hits on this site asking about the "meaning" of the line "They also serve who only stand and wait"

The line is from one of my favorite poems written by John Milton on his blindness. That's often the title you see it given "On his blindness" but I think when he wrote it he only gave it a number.

I like it so much that it is one of the few poems I have committed to memory. When I was younger I used to have a lot of things ready for recitation, and having played a "weird sister" ( surprising no one) in our high school production of MacBeth I was able to recite that whole play from start to finish for YEARS. But alas, as a middle aged person, room in my brain is being taken up with more mundane information such as phone numbers, what's on sale at Shoppers, how to make The Hub's complex stereo equipment play the radio, and the location and drive time to almost every public ladies room in the County in case of an Emergency.

Anyway, here it goes....

When I consider how my light is spent,
E`re half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one Talent which is death to hide,
Lodg`d with me useless, though my Soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, least he returning chide,
Doth God exact day-labour, light deny`d,
I fondly ask; But patience to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need
Either man`s work or his own gifts, who best
Bear his milde yoak, they serve him best, his State
Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o`re Land and Ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and waite.

One of the reasons why I like this sonnet so much is it's another one of those things you can file under "You think you've got problems"! John Milton had some serious problems, not the least of which was that he was ready for a divorce in a time and place that didn't allow it. To top it off, he rapidly lost his eye sight, which is a tough row to hoe for anybody....but it especially stinks if you are one of the greatest poets to ever write in the English language.

We're talking about the 1600's folks...so it wasn't like there were voice recognition software programs to help this guy get through his day. There wasn't even a particularly enlightened attitude about the disabled. At the time when our hero wrote these lines he was probably thinking something along these lines: "I'm screwethed"

So he considered "how his light is spent". "Light" means a lot of different things at once here, 'cause, after all, this is poetry. Sure it means the light he no longer has to see by, but it also means his talent, his soul. He asks himself what he's done so far with "half his days in this world dark and wide". Because he still had half of his life ahead of him. He had already written "Paradise Lost" but it wasn't looking good for the beginnings of "Paradise Regained" which he had parts of in his head but no way to get it out since he couldn't see to write anything down.

"And that one Talent which is death to hide" - his ability to write and his amazing talent "Lodged with me useless..."

By this time he WAS a poet. That's how he thought of himself. It's like one of those made for t.v. movies where the guy with the most talent as a skier or swimmer or football player suddenly gets hit by a drunk driver. He'd rather DIE than not be able to write poetry.

Luckily for him there was another fascet to his personality which he goes on to reveal, "...though my Soul more bent/ To serve therewith my Maker" - that would be God. Milton saw his talent as a gift from God and his poetry as the just return of that gift. God gave him the talent, and he tried in every word that he wrote to serve the Divine Origin of that talent. This was a guy to whom the modern concept "it's all about me" would have been foreign, and most likely, wildly funny.

But even such a faithful servant has to ask himself: what kind of cruel joke is this? IS the God he had served so faithfully over the years cruel? "Doeth God exact day labour, light denied?" He's saying, "Um, hello, excuse me? I don't mean to be rude here but....it's terribly difficult to do my very best work when I can't see the pen, the paper or any other daggone thing. Can ya give me a break here?"

And then, in the poem, immediately another thought follows. I bet, in Milton's real life it took many hours of tears, thought, prayers and staring out the window at shadows. But this "new thought", the whole end of the poem, is uplifting and freeing. "God doth not need/ Either man's work or his own gifts....His state is Kingly". Wow. Milton realizes that God didn't give Milton his talent to write because God needed poetry. God doesn't need anybody's poetry. He doesn't need anything. He's God! "His state is Kingly" and "...who best/ Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best" This line is an allusion to Jesus speaking in the Bible saying that the yoke of service Jesus lays upon humans is "easy and the burden light" What does all that mean?

Well, it's the realization that those who serve God "best" are those who serve the most willingly. Those who wait patiently to see what burden is laid upon them, confident that with His help they can bear it. They "bear the yoke". They aren't running off trying to do what THEY think is the right thing. They hang around waiting to be directed by God as oxen in the harness go where they are bid.

Milton was a celebrated poet by this time. He was good and he knew it. He was educated, he was a man of letters at a time few people could read. He was NOT an ox. He had freedom, passion, opportunities and he had taken advantage of them. He was not born to the servant class, nor to the class to whom any form of servatude came naturally.

But God, he acknowleged, is so much bigger than all of that. The world, and everything in it belongs to Him. "....thousands at his bidding speed/ And post over Land and Ocean without rest:"

And so, for himself, he reaches that famous, wise, and beautiful line "They also serve who only stand and wait" He is free. He doesn't owe anything to God or anybody else because everything was on loan to him the whole time. He trusts. God has something for him to do. It may not be as grand, as celebrated, as respected as being a poet....but whatever God wants him to do he's going to do it. Because to him the foremost thing is to remain in service to God. And so he ends the poem in a place of freedom and trust and peace. Whoa.

The rest of Milton's story is that he found a way around his disability. With the help of his daughter, he was able to dictate Paradise Regained and other poetry, essays, and letters. If you're a writer, you know how difficult that really is....and modern scientists now know that people use a completely different part of their brain when they speak then they do when they write. So not only did Milton adjust to the loss of his eyesight, he re-taught his brain how to think in middle age and lost none of his talent or power or gift in the process.

So if you're reading this on Monday and you're thinking "How the hell am I gonna get through this week?" maybe you should just relax, look around, take in the situation and kinda....stand and wait. See what comes up. Could be something good.

Oh, and if you're working on a paper do yourself a favor and site The Winged Creature...take this as a sign that wholesale plagerism isn't good for anybody. Thanks.