Classic Poem

Nature the mother hath her seas,
Her lakes, her vales, her mountain rifts,
And to her various sons she gives
Her various gifts.

To one the power of mighty mind,
To sway, to forge a people's chain,
And to another but to bear
A life-long pain.

To one rare soul her magic lore
Of will, keen insight, prophecy;
To do, to dare, and change all things
Beneath the sky.

Unto another to console,
To raise and succor, aid and heal
Those wounded ones who blindly drive
Fate's grinding wheel.

Not singly gifted was this man,
No simple furrow his to plow;
But with a burden of gifts the Mother kind
Did him endow.

The piercing wit, the splendid form,
The poet lip, the flashing eye,
And all that magic power of soul
That will not die.

Not his to rule with subtle skill,
To plot, to plan with fertile brain;
But with rare charm of mind and voice
To hold and chain.

Here where he sleeps we rear this stone,
Memorial of his spirit's force;
This valiant knight whom death alone
Could dare unhorse.

Alone he moved amid our clan,
A genial alien in our waste,
The courtly relic of an age
Of finer taste;

When kindly satire forged her darts,
And wit and learning leaned to rhyme;
And polished sentences were more in vogue,
And less a crime.

Courteous and manly, child of that
Rare charm old Erin grants her sons;
With all that humorous touch with which she dowers
Her rarer ones.

Not his to raise prophetic voice,
To sear the soul with flaming brand:
He stood for culture, genial, kind,
In our new land:

Where Force, oft naked, often clothed
In ruder garments than is meet,
Doth in grave senate halls parade,
As in the street.

Yea, he is gone, departed hence,
When shall our halls another find:
His kindly satire, scintillating wit,
His classic mind.

And o'er his grave Canadian love
Canadian grief a garland throws:
And our young muse a chaplet binds
About his brows.

Leaving his faults, his virtues rare,
His failure, hopes, to gentle heaven;
Forgiving his weakness, as we do also pray
To be forgiven.