Classic Poem

The South and East, the West and North,
Have poured their million marvels forth;
And now, withdrawn they are, at last,
While this dear wonder clings here fast.
Ah! Heaven's own work outstrips the rest
In this sweet baby at my breast;
Seeing whose face as smooth and white
As lilies breaking into light,
And eyes across whose deep, strange seas,
Thought sails as sailed the Genoese —
I think of some whose time-stained face
Has nowhere an unchannelled place,
Whose eyes are busy now no more,
Where Thought lies stranded on the shore.
Yet who, a hundred years ago,
Breathed as this infant smiling so!
And will you linger long as they
To count your hundredth natal day?
Oh! rather might God see it good
To give immortal babyhood,
And let this signal year of birth
Bear back its treasure from the earth.
A kindly cruel wish is this
For those who own the lips they kiss!
The poet's thought, the artist's look,
Fit best the picture and the book
And dreamy breast to which you come,
Not that on which you make your home.
Ah! beauteous thing, if you were mine,
I'd linger not in shade, but shine;
In present bounty chase away
Thought of a hundred years' decay,
Nor grudge to think this lovely one
Might be a centenarian;
Nay! I should wish to be one, too,
Rather than say good-by to you!