Classic Poem

WITH A COPY OF " MADEMOISELLE DE MAUPIN. "

This is the golden book spirit and sense,
The holy writ of beauty; he that wrought
Made it with dreams and faultless words and thought
That seeks and finds and loses in the dense
Dim air of life that beauty's excellence
Wherewith love makes one hour of life distraught,
And all hours after follow and find not aught.
Here is that height of all love's eminence
Where man may breathe but for a breathing space,
And feel his soul burn as an altar-fire
To the unknown God of unachieved desire,
And from the middle mystery of the place
Watch lights that break, hear sounds as of a quire,
But see not twice unveiled the veiled God's face.