THE POET

He stands above all worldly schism,

And, gazing over life's abysm,

Beholds within the starry range

Of heaven laws of death and change,

That, through his soul's prophetic prism,

Are turned to rainbows wild and strange.

Through nature is his hope made surer

Of that ideal, his allurer,

By whom his life is upward drawn

To mount pale pinnacles of dawn,

‘ Mid which all that is fairer, purer

Of love and lore it comes upon.

An alkahest, that makes gold metal

Of dross, his mind is — where one petal

Of one wild-rose will all outweigh

The piled-up facts of everyday —

Where commonplaces, there that settle,

Are changed to things of heavenly ray.

He climbs by steps of stars and flowers,

Companioned of the dreaming hours,

And sets his feet in pastures where

No merely mortal feet may fare;

And higher than the stars he towers

Though lowlier than the flowers there.

His comrades are his own high fancies

And thoughts in which his soul romances;

And every part of heaven or earth

He visits, lo, assumes new worth;

And touched with loftier traits and trances

Re-shines as with a lovelier birth.

He is the play, likewise the player;

The word that's said, also the sayer;

And in the books of heart and head

There is no thing he has not read;

Of time and tears he is the weigher,

And mouthpiece‘ twixt the quick and dead.

He dies: but, mounting ever higher,

Wings Phoenix-like from out his pyre

Above our mortal day and night,

Clothed on with sempiternal light;

And raimented in thought's far fire

Flames on in everlasting flight.

Unseen, yet seen, on heights of visions,

Above all praise and world derisions,

His spirit and his deathless brood

Of dreams fare on, a multitude,

While on the pillar of great missions

His name and place are granite-hewed.