Classic Poem

Tell me, ye shepherds of the upland plain,
What time the starry courts airial rang
With rapture of the loud, seraphic strain.
Did naught remain?
Did no heart learn the song the angels sang?

On the long slope beside the plashed pool,
Guarded by stunted thorn-trees, flaked with wool,
Where the sheep came to quench their seldom thirst —
O favored pool! that in thy tranquil space
Mirrored that night each rapt, immortal face
When on the drowsy ear the anthem burst,
And the strong seraphs hymned, in sacred joy,
Their glorious paean to the Holy Boy!
Was there no tuneful shepherd, nice of ear,
Who caught the lilt of that celestial art,
And evermore could hear
The mellow chorus singing in his heart?
In retrospective mood,
On home-made strings, or on the timbrel rude,
Could strike again
The music that the angels sang to men,
The music that high Heaven gave to earth
To celebrate the crowned Saviour's birth?

Through a long life one kept each perfect tone,
And, musing, made the melody his own:
Then, in the tempest times that swept the land,
And scattered far and wide the shepherd band,
One , seamed with grief and eld, and hoary grown,
Still sat, as erst, upon the accustomed stone,
When came again the night of all the year;
Again upon the consecrated ground,
With sons and grandsons reverent around,
Whose Christ-filled hearts His love had tuned to hear.
" Sing us, O shepherd, that angelic air! "
Then flowed the cadenced heavenly harmony
From out a soul grown beautiful thereby;
While the hushed group were gazing on the sky
As though they heard a seraph shout aloud,
From the white bosom of a moonlit cloud,
The holy song whose echoes shall not cease,
The song of peace.