Classic Poem

We shall be called harsh names by men unborn,
Since we have seen no glory in his face.
Our blindness shall not save us from the scorn
Of those who bend above the guarded case,
Where under glass his crowded note-book shines
(Pages we turn — dismiss with comment smug),
Become a thing a flaming dream enshrines,
The miracle we greeted with a shrug.

For now as always, tortured and alone,
Behind a paltry door he makes his fight;
Great thoughts sit down to dinner with a bone,
And beauty starves and sings and trims the light.
But no man comes — no man with praise for bread.
We shall be better friends when he is dead.