Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE PHILISTINE'S LAMENT, by W. C. A. WALLAR


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE PHILISTINE'S LAMENT, by                    
First Line: That I am blind to highest heaven
Last Line: Some eons hence be mine.
Subject(s): Philistines


That I am blind to highest Heaven
Is not my present pain:
Ten thousand beauties near at hand
Shine on my soul in vain.

Great verbal music poets sing
Is lost on my dull ear;
Their symbolism and overtones
I neither feel nor hear.

I have not scaled the Andes yet,
Nor sought the aloe's bloom;
The love of Elliot and Dark
Within me finds no room.

I grieve that Greek art does not stir
My soul, and make me think
As it did Ruskin, Blake and Keats;
As bees did Maeterlinck.

The scalpel and the microscope
Are useless toys to me;
Cremona violins as well
Might all be sunk at sea.

I have not prized marine-shell prisms;
Nor pressed the hands of queens;
Nor tasted wine on lady lips
The grape incarnadines.

So here once more I pledge my all
To search and pray and pine:
The Beatific Vision may
Some eons hence be mine.





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