Classic Poem

Fate

Singers who charmed the earth are dead:
Why singest thou to-day?

The Poet.

Because the laughing rose is red
And white the scented may,
And new-born golden light is shed
On silver stream and bay

Fate

Thou dwellest 'mid a heedless race:
They worship nought but gold

The Poet.

Yet will I lift a tearless face
Towards Beauty as of old
Her boons of love, her gifts of grace,
Are won but by the bold.

Fate

Shelley is dead, and Keats is gone,
And who will lift the lute?

The Poet.

Though these be dead, the same strong sun
Still changes flower to fruit:
The birds' hearts waken, one by one;
So why should I be mute?

Fate.

Sing! who will listen in our time?
The poet lives alone.

The Poet

Though men reject an idle rhyme,
The song-god knows his own, —
Inspires them with his breath sublime
That they may share his throne.