The good, the bad with equal zeal, With Gods, with fools, content to live. 'Sorrow, sorrow!' the angels cried, Again by night the poet went Beneath the darkling firmament To the seashore, to the old seawalls, Forth paced a star beneath the cloud, The constellation glittered soon, 'You have no lapse; so have ye glowed But once in your dominion. And yet, dear stars, I know ye shine I fall, my faith is broken, Ye scorn me from your deeps of blue. Or if perchance, ye orbs of Fate, Your ne'er averted glance Beams with a will compassionate On sons of time and chance, Then clothe these hands with power Nor plant immense designs Where equal means are none.' CHORUS OF SPIRITS. Means, dear brother, ask them not; Pure content is angel's lot, Thine own theatre art thou. Gentler far than falls the snow And woke the fear lest angels part. POET. I see your forms with deep content, I know that ye are excellent, But will ye stay? I hear the rustle of wings, Ye meditate what to say Ere ye go to quit me for ever and aye. SPIRITS. Brother, we are no phantom band; Brother, accept this fatal hand. Aches thine unbelieving heart By one thought to one same sphere; POET. Suns and stars their courses keep, Day and night their turn observe, Unsure the ebb and flood of thought, the Spirit not. SPIRITS. Brother, sweeter is the Law Than all the grace Love ever saw; Brother, no decrepitude Chills the limbs of Time; As fleet his feet, his hands as good, On Nature's wheels there is no rust; FRAGMENTS ON THE POET AND THE POETIC GIFT.1 I. THERE are beggars in Iran and Araby, SAID was hungrier than all; Hafiz said he was a fly That came to every festival. He came a pilgrim to the Mosque On trail of camel and caravan, 1 The poem "Beauty," the motto for the Essay bearing that name, was originally part of this poem. Where'er he went, the magic guide Kept its place by the poet's side. Said melted the days like cups of pearl, A cabin hung with curling smoke, Or gleam which use can paint on steel, Princely women hard to please, Fenced by form and ceremony, Decked by courtly rites and dress And etiquette of gentilesse. But when the mate of the snow and wind, He left each civil scale behind: Him wood-gods fed with honey wild And of his memory beguiled. He loved to watch and wake When the wing of the south-wind whipt the lake And the glassy surface in ripples brake And fled in pretty frowns away Like the flitting boreal lights, |