Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO DANTE ALIGHIERI, by FRANCES LANCE FERRERO


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO DANTE ALIGHIERI, by                    
First Line: O mighty master of the human song
Last Line: Sad exile, now at home in every land!
Subject(s): Dante Alighieri (1265-1321); Wellesley College


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!





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