WEEP, eyes that beauty brightens! Mourn, hearts whose wings are song! Whom love of man enlightens, And hate of wrong, Weep, gathering in your treasure! The giver now lies mute; The garden of our pleasure Bears no more fruit. Death, king of all disaster, Makes of his work an end, Bids us bewail a Master, The poor a friend. Son of the Skalds who chanted At Olaf's wassail board, His sagas bloom transplanted From firth and fiord. Therein with bright amazement We look, as one who peers Through some fair pictured casement On other years; Dreaming, we look and listen: Stout Harpdon's basnet rings, Rhodope's garments glisten, Rapunzel sings: Brynhild the Victory-Wafter, Gudrun and Sigurd pass; Holt, stead, and glowing rafter Adorn the glass. The tones waxed rarer, stronger; The brush glow'd in his hand: He wields it now no longer; The wizard wand Falls; but the windows kindle, Fixed in the Muses' shrine: Their lights in dark hours dwindle, At dawn they shine; And as he lies beneath them, Transfigured in their rays, We kiss his brows, and wreathe them With sad, sweet praise; Singing, Our poet craved not The well-earned laurel crown, But held his course and raved not At fools' renown; Not ours the sole bereavement: Art held our Master dear, Who, by his life's achievement Made Art sincere; Who, blameless, shrank from blaming, Was gracious to disgrace, Nor learned the trick of naming The hapless base; But still for Freedom striving Lived brave and debonair, Wat Tyler's soul surviving In Chaucer's heir. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ETUDES DE PLUSIERS PAYSAGES DE L' AME: 1 by HAYDEN CARRUTH SONGS FOR TWO SEASONS: 1. AFTER GRAVE ILLNESS by CAROL FROST ABOVE HALF MOON by JAMES GALVIN DOMESDAY BOOK: GOTTLIEB GERALD by EDGAR LEE MASTERS THE WIZARD IN WORDS by MARIANNE MOORE HOMAGE TO SEXTUS PROPERTIUS: 3 by EZRA POUND CLASS SONG (WHICH WILL BE SUNG ON THE 22ND OF FEBRUARY) by GEORGE SANTAYANA |