Classic Poem

What the mind of man has created,
What the hand of man has made with amorous patience,
Placing word by word in eloquent sequence,
Fashioning out of stone with the long worn hammer and chisel,
Laying color by color, inevitable in design;
These, made for his use, his pleasure, his worship,
May in time be lost, or may be scattered or broken;

Or stand, a vast piled, strong, brutal arena,
Holding still the shouts, and cries of the anguished,
Stand, a tall spire above some slumbering landscape,
Look down from the wall in colors that speak in silence;

Or broken, a headless torso with wind in the garment,
Colors faded, the intention strong in the outline,
Words of the song imperfect, the tune forgotten.
But the flame, the necessity that made them
Still burns us. Their passion remains.