Classic Poem

I.

N ot in the rashness of warm confidence,
Too vainly, self-assured that I was strong,
To struggle for and reach that eminence,
Around whose rugged steeps such terrors throng;
Did I resolve upon the perilous toil
Which calls for man's best strength and hardihood,
Ere he may win the height and take the spoil; —
But that a spirit stronger than my mood,
Stood ever by and drave me to the task! —
Oh! not in vain presumption did I choose
The barren honors of the unfruitful Nine,
Sure that no favor from them did I ask;
Small resolution did it need of mine,
To bind me to the service of the Muse!

II.

Even as the boy whom the stern prophet sire
Devotes, in some deep forest, with a vow —
So, with no thought of mine, and no desire,
Was I constrain'd to seek and sworn to bow
At altars, whose strange gods did never tire
Of service, but commanded night and day!
I knew no sports of comrades, — when in play
My young companions shouted, I was sad;
Fill'd with strange yearnings, — summon'd still away
To that lone worship — watchful, yet not glad!
Shall it be deem'd a voluntary mood
That leads the boy from boyhood, — sports he loves, —
The merry games of comrades, — still to brood,
While others laugh, in melancholy groves?