Classic Poem

On receiving a painting of the Isle.


Isle of beauty, thou art singing
To my sense a sweet refrain;
To my busy mem'ry bringing
Scenes that I would see again.

Chief, the charm of thy reflecting,
Is the moral that it brings;
Nature, with the mind connecting,
Gives the artist's fancy wings.

Soul, sublime 'mid human débris,
Paints the limner's work, I ween,
Art and Science, all unweary,
Lighting up this mortal dream.

Work ill-done within the misty
Mine of human thoughts, we see
Soon abandoned when the Master
Crowns life's Cliff for such as we.

Students wise, he maketh now thus
Those who fish in waters deep,
When the buried Master hails us
From the shores afar, complete.

Art hath bathed this isthmus-lordling
In a beauty strong and meek
As the rock, whose upward tending
Points the plane of power to seek.

Isle of beauty, thou art teaching
Lessons long and grand, tonight,
To my heart that would be bleaching
To thy whiteness, Cliff of Wight.