O MIGHTY master of the human song Whose burden fills the ages with its hurt, Its fierce and gloomed resentment and its long Desire for expiation, love-engirt, Thou daredst deny the schoolmen and to make A nation's norm of beauty from the curt Vernacular of tribal use, and break The cant of set philosophies by vital Being -- thou seer whose thought was wont to take For walks abroad, the universe! Requital Didst thou in vision give for Adam's slur -- "The woman that Thou gav'st, . . ." -- by much recital Perpetuate: thy lady's eyes no blur Of earth upon Jehovah's presence held; They moved thy course through heaven to Light with her, -- As she, so thou, by Life and Love impelled. What more of good from thee is need to find? Thou art not dead, for Time has never knelled Forgetfulness o'er thee! Thy winged mind Be present here, where men of alien face Thou dream'dst not, shall in fellowship rebind The laurels of thy fame -- as thine own race Devote to thee -- and let a woman's hand, For happiness, those laurels lay in place, Sad exile, now at home in every land! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...LAMENT FOR [THE DEATH OF] THOMAS DAVIS by SAMUEL FERGUSON THE NEWLY WEDDED by WINTHROP MACKWORTH PRAED THE HARLOT'S HOUSE by OSCAR WILDE THE BUBBLE by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM FROM AN OFFICE WINDOW by FRANCES M. BALLARD THE FOREST POOL by GRACE BLAINE |