Classic Poem

They hold the heart: they catch the breath,
So sweet in sound and sense are they.
What sweeter words could Life, or Death,
Or Love, or Wisdom say?

Yet who am I to dare to praise
So high an art, so fair a scroll?
Mine eyes are too profane to gaze
Into so pure a soul.

Such lofty spirits live apart
Above my ken, beyond my reach,
With foreign music in their heart,
Speaking an alien speech.

What fellowship have I with them,
Who hear the blood of Beauty beat,
I, who have merely kissed her hem,
And knelt beside her feet?

If one shall dare to take the hand
That touched the lyre to such a song,
To one like you who understand,
The honour should belong.

If anyone to praise shall dare,
O Lady, be it one like you,
Whose presence and whose life are fair,
Whose heart is sweet and true,

Whose beauty is itself a song,
An inspiration, a delight,
To whom things beautiful belong
By Beauty's royal right,

Whose soul is like a lucent stream,
Rippling with every passing breeze,
Radiant with many a rainbow dream,
Murmuring mountain melodies.

The flowers nod along its track,
And song-birds build among its rushes;
And oh, it flings the sunbeams back,
As silver smiles and rosy blushes!

So clear, so pure its currents are,
All beauty it reflects again;
The morning sun, the evening star,
Are given golden back to men.

Its eddies laugh, its ripples shine;
Beside its waters bright and blue,
My soul is like a pool of brine,
Which song and sunlight never knew.

To such as thee the poet sings,
'Tis thine to praise: thine eyes can see
Into the very heart of things,
By their pellucid purity.

And notes our coarser natures miss,
Thy finer nature apprehends,
Thy spirit and her spirit kiss
Like two familiar bosom friends.

Meseems that chiefly for thy sake
The little book of songs was writ,
That thy sweet heart and soul might make
Warm breathing beauty out of it.