Classic Poem

Rembrandt

Gazing upon that face where years have wrought
The record of their mingled loss and gain,
Where Love and Death, alternate joy and pain,
Have the hid soul to such expression brought, —
Life fills with vaster meaning to my thought.
'Neath change and loss I read what things remain
To crown at last the struggle and the strain
Of all our days, remembered or forgot.

O mighty Master! Shakespeare of the brush!
Interpreting to eye, as he to ear,
The story of earth's passion and its strife, —
Thy genius caught the new day's morning flush,
Saw glory in the common and the near,
And on immortal canvas gave us LIFE !English