Classic Poem

I.

Fair vessel of our daily light, whose proud
And previous glories gild that blushing cloud;
Whose lively fires in swift projections glance
From hill to hill, and by refracted chance
Burnish some neighbour-rock, or tree, and then
Fly off in coy and wingèd flames again:
If thou this day
Hold on thy way,
Know, I have got a greater light than thine;
A light, whose shade and back-parts make thee shine.
Then get thee down! then get thee down!
I have a Sun now of my own.


II.

Those nicer livers, who without thy rays
Stir not abroad, those may thy lustre praise;
And wanting light--light, which no wants doth know--
To thee--weak shiner!--like blind Persians bow.
But where that Sun, which tramples on thy head,
From His own bright eternal eye doth shed
One living ray,
There thy dead day
Is needless, and man to a light made free,
Which shows that thou canst neither show nor see.
Then get thee down! then get thee down!
I have a Sun now of my own.