Classic Poem

To a Friend

Thanks for the priceless offering thou hast brought!
It is a wreath of sweet, poetic flowers,
By the kind hand of partial friendship wrought
Amidst the witchery of fancy's bowers.

But wherefore hast thou hidden in the earth
The talents God bestowed on thee, so long?
Does thy proud spirit deem of little worth
Its blessed heritage, the gift of song?

Was it thy choice to win the prize of fame
Far from the sunny paths of glorious art;
To write in sterner characters thy name,
On that cold monument, the world's great heart?

Was it thy choice to leave the singing brooks,
The breezy hillside and the shady glen,
The violet-scented banks and quiet nooks,
For the broad thoroughfares of busy men?

Or was it stern necessity compelled
Thy lingering footsteps from the vales and streams
Of fancy's Aidenn, where the bards of eld
Lived, loved, and sung their own immortal dreams?

Endowed with genius, and that inner sense
Which apprehends the beautiful, thou art
Begirt, inwrapt with all the most intense
And passionate feelings of a poet's heart.

And art thou happy in the ceaseless roar
Of this cold world's great Babel? Canst thou find,
Amidst its hollow smiles and heartless lore.
Food for the cravings of thy towering mind?

Thou canst not. There are moments when thy soul,
Uprising in the strength that God has given,
Spurns from its pinions earth and earth's control,
To listen to the melodies of heaven.

In the still chambers of the solemn night,
When daily care has set thy spirit free,
Visions of beauty, glorious as the light,
Like holy vestals minister to thee.

But, oh! with all thy gifts of mind and heart,
Since thou art tending to the shadowy shore,
Neglect not to secure “that better part”
The crown of life enduring evermorey!English