Or what is closer to the truth, when I look at that of which I may regard myself as the imaginary possessor, I fix upon what would give me pleasure in my average moments: the satire upon curiosity in which no more is discernible than the intensity of the mood; or quite the opposite—the old thing, the mediæval decorated hat-box, in which there are hounds with waists diminishing like the waist of the hourglass and deer and birds and seated people; it may be no more than a square of parquetry; the literal biography perhaps, in letters standing well apart upon a parchment-like expanse; an artichoke in six varieties of blue; the snipe-legged hieroglyphic in three parts; the silver fence protecting Adam's grave, or Michael taking Adam by the wrist. Too stern an intellectual emphasis upon this quality or that, detracts from one's enjoyment; it must not wish to disarm anything; nor may the approved triumph easily be honored— that which is great because something else is small. It comes to this: of whatever sort it is, it must be "lit with piercing glances into the life of things"; it must acknowledge the spiritual forces which have made it. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A SHROPSHIRE LAD: 15 by ALFRED EDWARD HOUSMAN TO A STEAM ROLLER by MARIANNE MOORE TO SPAIN - A LAST WORD by EDITH MATILDA THOMAS OUT FROM A DREAM by ELLA ALLISON LEOLINE by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON SPRING AND WINTER by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |