Classic Poem

If homely virtues draw from me a tune
In jingling rhyme — or in ambitious rune;
Or if the smoldering future should inspire
My hand to try the seer's prophetic lyre;
Or if injustice, brutishness, and wrong
Stir me to make a weapon of my song;

O God, give beauty, truth, strength to my words —
Oh, may they fall like sweetly cadenced chords,
Or burn like beacon fires from out the dark,
Or speed like arrows, swift and sure to the mark.