Classic Poem

Into himself resolved by Death's great change,
The poet rouses with his clear, free tone,
His century too frightened to have known
That Death itself would praise in voice so strange.

'Twas like some hydra, who an Angel heard
Breathe strains too pure for tongues less pure to tell,
And thought the shining one had drunk the spell
Of some black wave, all noisome and perturbed, —

Oh struggle that the earth with Heaven maintains!
If my belief may not be sculptured there,
To make the tomb above the poet's dust more fair, —

That block which ever dark disaster stains, —
At least that granite should in future stay
Poe's old blasphemers from their evil way.