Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, KARL BITTER, by ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

KARL BITTER, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: O multitude of the untimely dead
Last Line: With grateful joy that such a soul should be.
Subject(s): Bitter, Karl Theodore (1867-1915); Friendship


O MULTITUDE of the untimely dead,
Who somewhere find and seal the endless thread
That ever to our eyes must broken be --
Ye who now labor with no Death to dread:

Take to your happy ranks this new access
Of flaming spirit, this pure guilelessness.
This noble fancy, this brave loyalty
That cherished Beauty more, not Honor less: --

Him whose divining skill had power to save
Too few alas! of all our wise and brave
In bronze so true that what to-day he took
From Life, to-morrow he to History gave: --

Him in the warmth of whose inspiring word
Youth was to memorable ardor stirred,
And found so clear a path that, though the guide
No more was seen, the pilgrim never erred; --

In whom such frank simplicity did dwell
To know him little was to know him well,
Till even the passer-by shall long recall
The cheerful music of a silent bell.

Masters of Art and servitors of Song,
Who somewhere your recessional prolong,
Forgive us if too much we mourn the man
So welcome now in your beloved throng.

As ye are happy at his coming, we
May not dissolve in grief his memory,
But keep his faith in Beauty as our own,
With grateful joy that such a soul should be.





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