What chilly cloister or what lattice dim Cast painted light upon this careful page? What thought compulsive held the patient sage Till sound of matin bell or evening hymn? Did visions of the Heavenly Lover swim Before his eyes in youth, or did stern rage Against rash heresy keep green his age? Had he seen God, to write so much of Him? Gone is that irrecoverable mind With all its phantoms, senseless to mankind As a dream's trouble or the speech of birds. The breath that stirred his lips he soon resigned To windy chaos, and we only find The garnered husks of his disused words. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ON BOARD THE '76; WRITTEN FOR BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL ODE TO SILENCE by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY HISTORY OF A LIFE by BRYAN WALLER PROCTER SONNET: 94 by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE INSTRUCTIONS, SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN IN PARIS, FOR THE MOB IN ENGLAND by MARY (CUMBERLAND) ALCOCK THE SINGERS OF DELLA ROBBIA by ALFRED BARRETT VINCENT VAN GOGH by HARRIET R. BEAN |