Classic Poem

When many a type has vanished from the earth
The souls that fiction gives us still shall live,
Imperishable through seasons fugitive,
Regenerate yearly with a strange new birth.
Sweet spirits we loved, pure lips that rang with mirth,
Faces with Beauty's priceless gifts to give, —
These shall man's homage through all time receive,
Tribute to theirs, and their creators' worth.

Brightest of all, I sometimes think, two faces
Will shine upon the future like twin stars,
Full of all gifts of laughter and joy for man:
One most at home in peril's deadliest places;
One whom no cloud despondent ever mars;
Good giant Porthos, deathless d'Artagnan.