BEAUTY

Was never form and never face

So sweet to SEYD as only grace

Which did not slumber like a stone,

But hovered gleaming and was gone.

Beauty chased he everywhere,

In flame, in storm, in clouds of air.

He smote the lake to feed his eye

With the beryl beam of the broken wave;

He flung in pebbles well to hear

The moment's music which they gave.

Oft pealed for him a lofty tone

From nodding pole and belting zone.

He heard a voice none else could hear

From centred and from errant sphere.

The quaking earth did quake in rhyme,

Seas ebbed and flowed in epic chime.

In dens of passion, and pits of woe,

He saw strong Eros struggling through,

To sun the dark and solve the curse,

And beam to the bounds of the universe.

While thus to love he gave his days

In loyal worship, scorning praise,

How spread their lures for him in vain

Thieving Ambition and paltering Gain!

He thought it happier to be dead,

To die for Beauty, than live for bread.