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Strategic
Optionality
Pathways Through Disruptive
Uncertainty

Surja Datta · Tobias Kutzewski

Strategic Optionality
 Surja Datta • Tobias Kutzewski

Strategic Optionality
Pathways Through Disruptive
Uncertainty
Surja Datta Tobias Kutzewski
Oxford Brookes University VU Amsterdam
Oxford, UK Amsterdam, The Netherlands

ISBN 978-3-031-17353-0    ISBN 978-3-031-17354-7 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17354-7

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature
Switzerland AG 2023
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether
the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of
illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and
transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar
or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication
does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant
protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book
are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or
the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any
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Cover illustration: © Alex Linch shutterstock.com

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
 Acknowledgement

We are able to look further because we have had the good fortune to
stand on the shoulders of giants. Isaac Newton said something similar,
and we wholeheartedly agree with him on this. We have benefited from
insights produced in diverse disciplines like cognitive science, complexity
science, anthropology and sociology. We have attempted to introduce a
new way of strategic thinking in this book, one which embraces uncer-
tainty rather than try to wish it away. To do so, we had to look for ideas
outside of the conventional strategy literature. Once on the journey, we
found plenty of gems strewn elsewhere, and we have not been hesitant to
borrow them for our endeavour. We express our gratitude to all the think-
ers who have impacted our thinking in myriad ways.
Throughout the writing of the book, we have actively shared the emer-
gent ideas with a host of entrepreneurs and industry practitioners, greatly
profiting, in the process, from those interactions. There are too many of
you to name here individually, but you know who you are, and we thank
you profusely for your time and viewpoints.
Our institutions, Oxford Brookes University and Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam, provided us with generous research hours which greatly

v
vi Acknowledgement

facilitated the authorship of this book, and for that we are grateful
to them.
At the end, we have to acknowledge the support of our families. They
have been our rock, and without their understanding and patience, this
book would not have seen the light of the day. So, Boni, Jishnu, Henrike,
Jakob, Kolja and Alma—a big thank you to all of you.
 Contents

1 I ntroduction  1

2 The
 Business Landscape: Unpacking the Idea of ‘Domain
Specificity’  9

3 The Conventional Wisdom in Strategy 37

4 Strategic Optionality: Introducing the Idea 91

5 Optionality and Innovation: Two Sides of the Same Coin?109

6 Competitive Success: Competing Across FRL Domains135

7 O
 ptionality: The Method169

8 C
 onclusion183

I ndex189

vii
 List of Figures

Fig. 2.1 Global flows 14

Fig. 2.2 Physical and digital spaces 22
Fig. 2.3 FRL domains 28
Fig. 2.4 +2 (additive) vs multiplicative 32
Fig. 3.1 Porter’s diamond 47
Fig. 3.2 Triple Helix 50
Fig. 3.3 Porter’s five forces 59
Fig. 3.4 Industry life cycle 62
Fig. 3.5 Generic strategies by Michael E. Porter 69
Fig. 3.6 SWOT matrix 76
Fig. 3.7 BCG matrix (illustration is derived from original article
published on the company website of the Boston Consulting
Group)84
Fig. 3.8 Ansoff Matrix 86
Fig. 4.1 Risk/uncertainty 93
Fig. 5.1 Diffusion of innovation 112
Fig. 5.2 4Ps of Innovation 115
Fig. 5.3 Nine dots 119
Fig. 5.4 Product life cycle 123
Fig. 5.5 The Innovation Process 128
Fig. 6.1 The 4RS of competitive success 136

ix
x List of Figures

Fig. 6.2 VRIO framework 138

Fig. 6.3 Determinants of competitive success for an MNC at a foreign
location148
Fig. 6.4 Multiplicity of roots 154
 1
Introduction

In 2016, Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s CEO, warned the company’s shareholders

that ‘one common pitfall for large organizations—one that hurts speed
and inventiveness—is “one-size-fits-all” decision making’.
So, what did Bezos mean by ‘one-size-fits all decision-making’?

Some decisions are consequential and irreversible or nearly irreversible—

one-way doors—and these decisions must be made methodically, carefully,
slowly, with great deliberation and consultation. If you walk through and
don’t like what you see on the other side, you can’t get back to where you
were before. We can call these Type 1 decisions. But most decisions aren’t
like that—they are changeable, reversible—they’re two-way doors. If you’ve
made a suboptimal Type 2 decision, you don’t have to live with the conse-
quences for that long. You can reopen the door and go back through. Type
2 decisions can and should be made quickly by high judgement individuals
or small groups.

In business schools we have traditionally taught Bezos’ ‘Type 1’ decision-­

making. Strategic decisions are arrived at methodically, and they are con-
sidered irreversible. Bezos’ ‘Type 2’ decision-making constitutes an alien

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 1

S. Datta, T. Kutzewski, Strategic Optionality,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17354-7_1
2 S. Datta and T. Kutzewski

territory as far as conventional strategic thinking is concerned. In this

book we discuss Bezos’ Type 1 and Type 2 decisions and more. Moreover,
we will specify the conditions that necessitate Type 1 and Type 2
decision-making.
The business landscape has altered in fundamental ways over the last
couple of decades. To be frank, dear readers, strategic thinking has not
kept pace with the change. There are many reasons for this, which we go
into detail in Chap. 4, but the main one is that the concepts which under-
pin the current thinking are unable to cope with a high level of uncer-
tainty. Thus, we need new conceptual lenses, frameworks that are
comfortable with uncertainty.
Large parts of the business landscape are now fraught with uncertainty.
This is not a bad thing. A key message of the book is that uncertainty
portends both losses and gains. There are situations where individuals and
businesses should cherish and embrace uncertainty. Having said that, a
sizable part of the business environment is still relatively stable, where
changes occur at a sedate pace. Strategies that work well within domains
of high uncertainty will not be effective within the stable ones. There is a
saying that you need horses for courses and this holds true when it comes
to strategic decision-making as well.
Strategy is about making choices. This is well understood in the extant
literature. However, the choice menu has traditionally been unnecessarily
restricted. Conventional strategy wisdom suggests that firms need to
choose how to compete within an industry (either by differentiating their
products vis-à-vis their competitors or by achieving a cost leadership
position). In contrast, we argue that firms need to exercise choice relating
to the domains as well. They can choose to enter/operate in/exit domains
that are either uncertain or stable or both. We elucidate the factors that
guide such strategic choices in the book.
Our lives, particularly if we live in a developed country, seem full of
choices that we can make. But of course, not all choices or options are the
same; some are more significant than others.
Strategic options are about significant choices. The other day on
Facebook, an ice-cream ad popped up on one of our feeds, offering the
options of watching their ‘exotic mango’ or ‘brownies and cream’ videos.
That represented a choice-set, but was it a significant one? Of course not.
 1 Introduction 3

This type of choice-sets can never be strategic in nature. Strategic options

are about choices that can potentially alter the course of your life (or that
of a firm).
The business landscape has always evolved. But what is different now
is the pace of change. The biggest drivers of change are globalisation and
digitisation. Globalisation, conceptualised as a series of global flows that
transcend national borders (Datta et al., 2021), is of course quite an old
phenomenon. But the velocity of these flows has gone up within most
nation-states because of removal of barriers to these flows. As we explain
in Chap. 2, the higher the velocity of global flows within a context, the
greater is the uncertainty. The other driver of change is digitisation which
kicked off with the Internet revolution in the early 1990s, and the pace
of which has exponentially increased in the twenty-first century.
People like to make the distinction between physical and digital, real
and virtual. They like to think of them as separate domains—there is the
real world and then there is the virtual world, and their dynamics are
distinct from each other. This way of thinking is increasingly becoming
redundant. There is a physi-digi reality out there. The real and virtual
have intertwined in such a way that there’s a new reality which is neither
physical nor digital. The dynamics of the physi-digi reality cannot be
understood by studying its constituent parts separately. As with any com-
plex system, it’s the interaction between the two that matters.
Much of the heightened uncertainty that we encounter across the busi-
ness landscape can be attributed to this new physi-digi reality. Multiple
industries that have been hitherto exclusively physical suddenly find
themselves as part of this physi-digi reality.
Take the mechanical watch industry, for example, which is over
500 years old. The current industry leader, Rolex, still does business the
old way, manufacturing its watches in Switzerland and selling them
through the physical stores of its authorised dealers across the globe. But
this time-tested business model is in the process of getting disrupted by
newcomers like Christopher Ward, a UK-based watch company. Like
Rolex, Christopher Ward manufactures (incidentally, in Switzerland) and
sells mainly mechanical watches. Unlike Rolex, however, it does not have
any physical stores, but its reach is global through the Internet. Before the
advent of the Internet, a company like Christopher Ward could not even
4 S. Datta and T. Kutzewski

think of competing with the likes of Rolex. The Internet has allowed the
firm to fuse the physical and digital in an innovative way, and in doing so
it has managed to disrupt the incumbents.
Consider the disruption that Airbnb has caused to the hotel industry.
A business that was erstwhile firmly rooted in the physical world has sud-
denly migrated to the physi-digi space where things are much more fluid,
a whole lot more uncertain. Organisations that capture value in the
physi-digi space are different in nature from those that do the same in the
physical space. The competitive dynamics in the physi-digi reality are
fundamentally different from those in either pure physical or pure digital.
We explore and explain the physi-digi reality in Chap. 2.
There are no universal laws in social sciences. This is particularly true
for business management. For far too long, strategy frameworks have
been put forward as ideas that are universally applicable. The reality is
that these frameworks are like heuristics (such as rules of thumb) and less
like physical laws. Moreover, these heuristics are domain specific. Just as
a heuristic for an entrepreneur can be completely irrelevant for a salaried
person, a strategy heuristic that works brilliantly in one domain can be
redundant in another. In Chap. 2, we specify three types of business
domains—fragile, robust and long-shot. Strategies in these domains are
qualitatively different from one another.
Heightened uncertainty that characterises a large part of the business
landscape necessitates new conceptual lenses. In this book, we introduce
the idea of optionality (Chap. 4) and argue that option thinking is par-
ticularly effective in the long-shot domain. But this does not mean that
conventional strategy tools are without value. We show that traditional
strategy thinking works well in relatively stable business environments
(Chap. 3).
Conventional strategy has been preoccupied with ‘competitive advan-
tage’. Competitive advantage, in turn, has been narrowly conceptualised
as being able to generate superior profits vis-à-vis one’s rivals. In this book
we use the term competitive success which is not necessarily about gener-
ating higher profits quarter on quarter or year on year. In specific situa-
tions, surviving may be more critical for the firm than the generation of
superior profits. More interestingly, it may even be desirable for firms to
embrace losses in specific contexts. If you are a player within the
 1 Introduction 5

long-­shot domain (as discussed in Chap. 2), it is very likely that you will
experience losses more frequently than profits. One of the objectives of
the book is to help decision-makers be more strategic about value creation.
The rest of the book is organised in the following way. In Chap. 2, we
explain and elucidate the two main factors that are behind heightened
uncertainty in the business environment. Globalisation and digitisation
are disrupting the business landscape as never before. We use the global
flows framework (Datta et al., 2021) to explain how globalisation engen-
ders uncertainty. Digitisation has accelerated global flows, in particular,
those in goods, services and capital. We are used to thinking of the physi-
cal and digital as two separate realms. We argue in the chapter that the
time has come to think of a new physi-digi reality that has materialised
due to the physical and digital intermingling in innumerable ways. The
physi-digi reality has its own distinct competitive dynamics which we
explore in the chapter. We divide the business landscape into three
domains—fragile, robust and long-shot, each with its own competitive
dynamics. The classification system is important because it highlights the
fact that strategic thinking needs adaptation to the context. Context is
indeed king.
In Chap. 3, we consolidate the key insights from the extant literature
on strategic management. The conceptual underpinnings of what we may
term as the conventional wisdom are highlighted here. As we show in the
chapter, conventional wisdom is not well equipped to deal with high
uncertainty but works quite well in stable business situations. In the
chapter, we stress-test the strategy tools under conditions of high uncer-
tainty to evaluate the extent to which they can adapt to such a situation.
Optionality is the state of having options. An option, put simply, is the
right but not the obligation to do something. Optionality works best
when you are not certain how the future will pan out. The idea of real
options is not new to strategic management, but the way it has been used
in the book is certainly novel. We think that the idea of optionality, which
is a powerful one, has been used in an unnecessarily restricted fashion
within the extant literature. The literature has been preoccupied in com-
puting options value of real assets, borrowing from the established
method of valuing financial options. Although we do not devalue the
usefulness of this approach, we suggest that the bigger payoff in using
6 S. Datta and T. Kutzewski

optionality comes from its strategic deployment, to aid in decision-mak-

ing in a more general sense. In Chaps. 4 and 7, we show how strategic
thinking can incorporate optionality and explicate in which domains this
way of strategising is most effective.
Once your eyes are opened to optionality, you see options everywhere.
The company 3M innovates a lot, and it also experiments a lot. 3M’s
intensity of innovation is correlated with the intensity of their experi-
mentation with new products. Optionality always involves a trial-and-
error approach. Innovation often emerges out of a trial-and-error process.
Firms can enhance their capacity to innovate by embracing optionality.
In Chap. 5, we explain the link between optionality and innovation.
Understanding that the competitive dynamics within the FRL domains
differ from each other raises an interesting question. Should firms choose
to compete within a domain or across domains? We address this question
directly in Chap. 6. Somewhat counterintuitively, often it makes more
strategic sense for firms to compete across robust and long-shot domains.
Competing solely within a long-shot domain can increase fragility of the
organisation. In the chapter, we develop an integrated framework that
aids strategic decision-­making across domains. The framework combines
the 4R framework (Datta et al. 2021), FRL domain classification and
optionality.
In Chap. 7, we explicate a step-by-step approach to instilling option
thinking in strategy-making. This chapter brings together insights from
the previous chapters, synthesises them and transforms them into a
framework that can guide strategic actions of the organisation.

A Note on the Theories Covered in the Book

We cover a lot of theories, conceptual frameworks and ideas in this book.
It is thus useful to remind us of what theories are for. Management gurus,
sometimes, present their ideas as gospel, as universal truths that are valid
everywhere and for everyone. Management theories are not universal
laws. This is an important point. The ideas that we discuss in the book are
like heuristics, the rules of thumb, they work most times, sometimes they
don’t. Think about the London Underground map. It doesn’t represent
 1 Introduction 7

the geographic reality of the London Underground, yet it’s highly useful
for navigating that reality. Harry Beck designed the stylistic Underground
map in 1933 which is still in use. Before that, the original map of the
Underground was closer to the geographic reality, yet it was less useful.
Good theories are like good maps—they pare down reality to the key ele-
ments/dynamics. They do not pretend to represent reality, but at the
same time, they help us come to grips with reality. Keep this in mind, as
you navigate the multitude of theories that we cover in this book.

A Note on the Writing Style

The writing style we have adopted for the book is conversational. We
have consciously avoided academese, the pretentious writing style some-
times academics adopt, primarily when they intend to communicate with
other academics. Our targeted reader is not an academic; but ought rather
be seen as a practitioner or a student or someone who is just interested in
learning about business strategy. To facilitate reading, we have not bur-
dened the narrative with in-text references. We have provided extensive
endnotes on sources and have also included a list of further reading at the
end of each chapter.

Reference
Datta, S., Roy, S., & Kutzewski, T. (2021). Unlocking strategic innovation:
Competitive success in a disruptive environment. Routledge.
 2
The Business Landscape: Unpacking
the Idea of ‘Domain Specificity’

The French accord great importance to ‘terroir’, the term encompassing

all the environmental factors that affect a crop’s phenotype. The quality
of the French wine is inextricably linked with its environmental context.
In a similar vein, the strategy frameworks that we cover in the book are
all domain specific. One of the weaknesses of the strategic management
discipline has been to not pay attention to this domain specificity. The
frameworks are put forward as applicable universally across the landscape.
This is an obvious oversell. Heuristics that work in one domain may be
ineffective in another. We redress this problem in the book by first clas-
sifying the different domains and then matching the strategy heuristics
with the domains where they work best. In this chapter, we develop the
domain classification framework. As you would see later in the chapter,
the level of uncertainty is a key distinguishing feature of the different
domains. Disruptive uncertainty is now the key distinguishing feature of
much of the landscape. So, what has led to this situation? We suggest that
the pervasive uncertainty is engendered by two main factors—globalisa-
tion and digitisation.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 9

S. Datta, T. Kutzewski, Strategic Optionality,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17354-7_2
10 S. Datta and T. Kutzewski

Globalisation
Globalisation is both old and new. It is old in the sense that people and the
ideas they carry with them have always travelled across the geographical
space ever since we evolved as a species in east Africa. It is new, however,
in the sense that nation-states are a relatively recent invention, and one
useful way to understand globalisation is to conceptualise it as a series of
global flows that circulate through nation-states (Datta et al., 2021).
Somewhat counterintuitively, globalisation and nation-states are two
interrelated constructs. When different flows cross national boundaries,
they become transnational. Before the invention of the nation-state, there
were mere flows across geographical space and time; they were not ‘global’.
So, what are global flows? Global flows are movements in capital,
goods, services and ideas that come from outside the national boundaries,
which circulate within the nation at varying velocities, and flow out of
the country and into other nation-states.1 The process takes place on a
continuous basis.
The velocity at which these flows circulate within an economy is key.
The higher the velocity of the flows, the greater the uncertainty in the envi-
ronment. The velocity of the global flows is dependent on ‘expeditors’ or
‘barriers’ which are mainly national in character (highlighting, once again,
the link between globalisation and nation-states). Expeditors facilitate
global flows consequently increasing their velocity within a specific con-
text. Barriers inhibit global flows, hence decreasing velocity. North Korea
has lots of barriers to global flows, very few expeditors, and the velocity of
global flows is very low in the country. At one level, this makes certain
things more predictable in the short to medium term. Of course, there are
consequences of cutting off global flows, and over the long term, the situa-
tion becomes even more fragile (this should not be taken as true uncer-
tainty, as we know things can go only one way which is downhill).
In contrast, consider the case of the Netherlands. The country is open
to global flows and has lots of expeditors and very few barriers. The

1
Also see Ritzer (2015) for a detailed exposition of the idea of global flows.
 2 The Business Landscape: Unpacking the Idea of ‘Domain… 11

velocity is high which leads to greater uncertainty in the business envi-

ronment. However, the economy becomes more robust and less fragile
because of the uncertainty.
Countries are not automatic recipients of global flows. A country like
North Korea may deliberately avoid global flows by erecting barriers, but
there are other countries who would like to attract global flows to their
shores but fail to do so because of lack of expeditors. A strong intellectual
property regime is an expeditor, so is a robust legal system. Expeditors are
institutions—formal ‘rules of the game’ (North, 1990).
The UK fully exited the EU on 31 December 2020. EU membership
is an expeditor because the club facilitates (a) free flow of capital, people,
services and goods within the member states and (b) attracts global flows
from outside of the EU because of the common set of rules that govern
the world’s largest single market. So, the UK exiting the EU was, in effect,
creating an additional barrier to global flows.
Some economists predicted dire consequences of erecting this barrier.
Their predictions, in general, have not come true. The resilience of the
UK economy in the face of two big shocks—the Covid pandemic and
Brexit—has surprised many. This, however, does not mean that the erec-
tion of the barrier didn’t have any effect. The labour market squeeze in
2021 was very real. Firms encountered real challenges in recruiting peo-
ple. But overall, the impact was milder than expected. Why? People
often conflate globalisation with movement of people across national
borders. Transnational movement of people is indeed one of the differ-
ent global flows that are out there, but it is exactly that, just one of them.
Whilst free flow of people between the UK and the EU did get dis-
rupted, other flows like goods, capital and most importantly remote ser-
vices were largely unaffected. In fact, what economists who expected a
greater adverse impact most likely underestimated was the level of work
that now can be accomplished remotely. Because of the Covid pandemic,
remote working has accelerated across the globe. It underlines the fat
that a lot of work that earlier could only have been carried out in a face
to face environment can now be done remotely. The key factor respon-
sible for this shift is digitisation of business processes which we focus on
in the next section.
12 S. Datta and T. Kutzewski

Not all global flows are equal. Economists, by and large, agree that
global flows in goods and services are welfare-enhancing.2 By this they
mean that as goods and services are exchanged across national borders,
both parties become better off due to the exchange because of specialisa-
tion of factors of production (labour and capital). Classical and neoclas-
sical trade theories place a great emphasis on this welfare-enhancing
nature of the global flows in goods and services.
Global flows in goods and services do cause uncertainty through their
circulation within the national systems. They often disrupt domestic
businesses, cause unemployment and usher in technological changes.
These flows can also reinforce status quos which may not be ideal for
some countries from the development perspective. Consider Country A
flow of goods as an example. The global inflows are mainly manufactured
goods, whilst the global outflows are mainly commodities (like rice and
oil). That is a recipe for underdevelopment in the long run as manufac-
tured goods enjoy increasing returns with increased output, whilst com-
modities experience decreasing returns with increases in the output. This
is the reason why many development economists (Krugman, 1995) advo-
cate for protectionism, to protect domestic industry against foreign com-
petition and allow it to grow to its full potential.
Notwithstanding the above critiques, overall, the consensus is strong
about the beneficial impact of global flows in goods and services. However,
that consensus breaks down when it comes to evaluating the pros and
cons of the global flows in capital.
Global flows in capital have the potential to create more disruption
than those in goods and services. There is usually a transfer of property
rights with the exchange of goods and services. When you buy a mechan-
ical watch from Switzerland, sitting in your office in London, there is a
transfer of property right from the manufacturer to yourself. The manu-
facturer cannot force you to return the watch. With transnational capital
flows, there is often no change in ownership. Your investments in the
German equity market are still owned by you. This means that capital

2
See, for example, Deardorff (1982) for an explanation of how international trade increases the
welfare of citizens of both countries that are parties to that trade.
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II..
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lakkaamatta keinuu vain…

Siniseksi kaikki käy, mitään muut' ei enää näy. Hullu,

syvälle ken niin hukkui silmiin sinisiin!
KEVÄTESIKOT.

Oli taivas heleän sininen ja aamun kohua täynnä tori. Luo

tytöntypykkä pieni sai kädessä kukkaskoti. Oli taivas sininen.

Hän minulle keltakimppusen

myi silmin ilosta kimmeltävin.
Kivet soittivat jalkaini alla.
Kuin yli pilvien kävin
kera keltakimppusen.

»Näin varhaisella sun kukitti ken?» soi puistosta armaan

naurava ääni. On surku somuutta kukkain: kun suudelmin
peitti hän pääni, ne kuolivat rutistuen.
ALLI.

Soi ulapalta ääni allin harmaan. Sa mietit: »Vilu aavalla on

varmaan, kun vihaisesti ärjyy vaahtopäät ja tuuli irroittaapi
salmen jäät.»

Niin monin aamuin valituksen kuulit

ja mieles heltyi — lemmeksi sen luulit.
Ah, että säälistä se heltyi vain
mua vuoksi kohtaloni armahtain!

Sa laske jälleen ulapoille alli, sen kuolla kevättalven

tyrskyyn salli, kun vihaisesti ärjyy vaahtopäät ja tuuli irroittaapi
salmen jäät.
MENNYT.

Sa ruusut sylihini kannoit,

yön tähden kiinsit hiuksihin.
Sa huulilleni soinnut annoit.
Kuin huilu nauroin, helisin.

Myös opettanut oisit mulle

kuink' unhottaa pois kaiken sen!
Jäi puolet sielustani sulle.
Kuin viulu itken, värisen.
ITKEVÄ LINTU.

Jo kuoppasimme nurmeen me raukan tuskistaan. Sen rinnan

punahurmeen joi ahnas multa maan. Syyslehdet ylle kummun
on puista varisseet. Nyt viisahat me oomme ja vanhat,
väsyneet.

Mut joka ilta saapi se jälleen ikkunaan, min takaa

tirskuttaapi ja värjyy viluissaan. Yön kaiken kartanolta kuin
itkun ääni soi… Se kuollut ei? — Siis miksi sen hautasimme,
oi!

III.
MYRSKY.

Rajutuuli ruoskien lehtiä ajaa! Terässiima sinkuvi, piiskaniskut

kajaa: Taistohon, taistohon, tahdoit taikka et! Kiivas on
kamppailu, hurmeessa kalvat, sodan laki säälitön, orjain
henget halvat. Legioonat kentille lyötyinä jää tuhannet!

Huutavi myrskyhyn silvottu sielu: — Myötäsi vie minut,

tuhon tulinielu, taistohon, taistohon tahdon sukeltaa! Kaikkeni
heittää hiuskarvan varaan, haavoissa nauttia Voittoni paraan!
tuskasta juopua turtunut. tuntoni saa!
DANSE MACABRE.

Taas taudin poltetta, purppuraa on täynnä puistikot, kentät,

kunnaat. Näin kesän huumeisen kisailusta syys korjaa
katkerat lunnaat. Oi, kaikki kauneus sairastaa! On marjat
pihlajan niinkuin verta. Tuo kuumehehkua, kuihtumusta maan
riemu runsainkin kerta.

Syysusvat kalseat kaupungin nyt kietoo vaippaansa lailla

houruin ja hiilenkarvaiset sauhut mataa tuol' yllä kattojen
kouruin. On löyhkä ilmassa spitaalin ja myrkkyhöyryjä nousee
maasta. Vuon ruostelaineihin lehdet sataa kuin rutonkeltainen
saasta.

Nyt kutsuu kuolema karkeloon, jo vinkuu viulut ja rummut

raikaa ja tuhkanharmaalta taivahalta vain nauru naakkojen
kaikaa. Siis tanssi hillitön alkakoon! Puut huitoo hurjasti oksin
paljain ja kolkon tuomiokirkon alta käy vainaat juontihin
maljain.
BERBERIS.

Taas aamuvarhaisella vanha tieni vie halki noenharmaan

kaupungin. On myöhäissyys. Sa yksin, pensas pieni maan
puoleen taivut oksin riutuvin.

Sun ylles vedenraskaat hiuteet hajoo

ja käärii sairaan sadeharsoillaan.
Mut kuumeenpunaisina putoo, vajoo
sun marjas lumihyhmään valkeaan.

Kuin hapan viini hankeen pisaroivat

sun verikyyneleesi kirpeät.
Ma tiedän, mistä kertoa ne voivat
ja mitä mykkyyteensä kätkevät.

Sun tiedän kärsimyksen kalkin juoneen, oi Berberis, sa

pensas punainen! Ma alttarille talven suruhuoneen myös itken
intohimot sydämen.
LOKAKUU.

Aamukylmä. En kierrekaihdinta nosta. Kuuluu aution

huoneeni hämärään tuulen tyhjä puhelu puistikosta,
naurunhohotus käheä sadesään.

Lehdet siellä kultaiset kulisevat,

jotka mädätä lumen alla saa,
kypsät hedelmät haljeten putoilevat,
kalmanhajua uhoo kostea maa.

On se voimakas ollut ja kaunista luonut.

Aivoissa nyt ei aatosta yhtäkään.
Ah, se on liioin syönyt ja liioin juonut! —
Yltyy nauru käheä sadesään.
LAULU SYKSYISESTÄ IKÄVÄSTÄ.

Ah ystävä, mua seuraa ikäväni kuin ukkospilvi musta,

muodoton, ja niinkuin paasi painaa sydäntäni se tunto, että
turhaa kaikki on.

Maa kevään aikaan ihanuuden hurmaa

niin ylen paljon synnyttää ja luo:
Syys saapuessaan kaiken ruhjoo, surmaa
ja luonnon kuuman sydänveren juo.

Oi katso, makaa puistokäytävillä

taas ruskein kasoin lehdet kuollehet,
ja niinkuin ruumiit riippuu seinämillä
nyt paleltuneet krassiköynnökset.

Niin kuolee kaikki kaunis iäst' ikään, pois ilo, lempi katoo,
ystäväin! On syys mun tehnyt sairahaksi, mikään ei lääkitä voi
ikävöintiäin.
ROCOCO.

Kurkistaapi sisään ikkunasta talviaamu takaa uudinten

nukkujata vuoteen silmäillen, naista nuorta, vielä melkein
lasta.

Illan kaunotarta katsoo huomen,

näkee ihon heljän harmenneen,
sinertävän vaon piirtyneen
alle ummistetun silmäluomen.

Silkkihiukset sekoo pehmeästi

pieluksien kultakirjailuun,
mutta pienen, pilkallisen suun
punamaali viiltää pistävästi.

Rutistuneet ruusut peittää maton huivi, viuhka, kirje

vierellään. — Aamuauringoll' on hymyssään kaihomieli sanoin
lausumaton.
HIILIPIIRROS.

Musta, sankka savupatsas lailla käärmehen kohoo

sysikiemuroina ilman lakehen — haihtuu niinkuin houreuni,
aatos syntinen.

Sumu kietoo suortuvansa rantapetäjiin, liukuu pitkin

ulappaa sen ääriin etäisiin. Pimeys kuin myrskyn paine siivin
saapuu niin.

Tuikkii tunnein pitkin yössä lyhty majakan, valon heittää

valjun ylle aavan maiseman. Kaukaa lyöpi malmikello kerran
ainoan.
VIERAS.

Ma talviyössä valvon, seuranani vain kasvot vihertävät

kuollehen —! Käy kylmän väreet pitkin ruumistani, ja sydän
seisahtuu kuin kuunnellen.

On armaan kielokimppu huoneessani, ja ilmassa ui

sulotuoksu sen. Mut suusta vainajan lyö vastahani maan
ummehtuneen löyhkä saastainen.

Tuo mykkä vieras miten tuijottaakaan!

Oi, etkö kerran kuoltuasi saakaan
sa jäädä mullan syvään lepohon?

Viel' elävien sääliäkö anoin. öin harhaat tuskallisin

sielunjanoin luo kauhunsairaan ihmisolennon?
SUOHAUTA.

Näin unta: korpisuohon upposin, ja toivo pelastuksen puuttui

multa. Ei peninkulmiin häämöttänyt tulta, ja seutu peittyi
pakkashuuruihin!

Mut yöhön huusin voimin viimeisin ja apua viel', armas,

anoin sulta: on sydämesi niinkuin puhtain kulta, se pysyy,
kaikki muu jos pettääkin!

Vain syvemmälle liejuun jalka vajoo…

Sun tiesi tietymättömissä kulkee,
et kuule epätoivonhuutoain!

Jo silmissäni tummuu, särkyy, hajoo,

suohauta minut uumeniinsa sulkee! —
Ma herään pimeässä parahtain.
IV.
KEVÄTHYMNI.

On Jumala hyvä, Hänen tekonsa hyviä ovat. Tänä päivänä

suli kuin pakkasjää kaikk' ajatukseni kovat. Ma onnesta itken
ja kyyneltulvahan hukun. Kevätpuroina katkeruus virtaa pois,
ma kiitos huulilla nukun.

On Jumala hyvä,
taas miljoonat silmut Hän avaa.
Kukat, hyönteiset talvihorteestaan
Hänen henkäisyllään havaa.
On Jumala hyvä,
Hänen lempensä määrää on vailla,
jalanjälkensä kultaiset nähdä voin
ma vesillä ja mailla.

On Jumala hyvä, taas katsoo Hän ihmisen puoleen, joka

talven tappavan painon alla on vaipunut pimeään huoleen. On
Jumala hyvä, Hän hymynsä säteillä antaa, Hänen silmäinsä
loiste on mittaamaton kuin meri, jolla ei rantaa.