From the wreck of Hopes far-scattered, Tempest-shattered, Floating waste and desolate;— Ever drifting, drifting, drifting Currents of the restless heart; Till at length in books recorded, They, like hoarded Household words, no more depart. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow [1807-1882] TO THE MUSES WHETHER on Ida's shady brow, Or the green corners of the earth, Where the melodious winds have birth; Whether on crystal rocks ye rove, How have you left the ancient love The languid strings do scarcely move, The sound is forced, the notes are few. William Blake [1757-1827) "WHITHER IS GONE THE WISDOM AND THE POWER" WHITHER is gone the wisdom and the power The Muses 2917 cell and every blooming bower our spirits with their roundelays. Hartley Coleridge [1796-1849] THE MUSES ›ld the Muses sat on high, nd heard and judged the songs of men; ›ne they smiled, who loitered by; toiling ten, they slighted ten. ey lightly serve who serve us best, ut violence and toil we shun." en say true, the Muses now ach one with the other vies, f those who weave romance or song: yet methinks I hear the hest ome murmuring down from Helicon: ey lightly serve who serve us best, or know they how the task was done!" Edith M. Thomas [1854 THE MOODS (AFTER READING CERTAIN OF THE IRISH POETS) THE Moods have laid their hands across my hair: and my Of little verses, or a dancing child. heart My heart turns crying from the rose and brook, Now I shall blow like smitten candle-flame; My pity and my joy are grown alike; my I cannot sweep the strangeness from heart. hair: The Moods have drawn swift fingers through my heart. Fannie Stearns Davis [18 THE PASSIONATE READER TO HIS POET DOTH it not thrill thee, Poet, Dead and dust though thou art, To feel how I press thy singing Close to my heart? he Flight of the Goddess at night to my pillow, ain when the delicate morning I bathe thy pages Here in the light of the sun; h thy leaves, as a wind among roses, The breezes shall run. w I take thy poem And bury within it my face, 2919 essed it last night in the heart of a flower, Or deep in a dearer place. as I love thee, Poet, ou not happy, Poet? ilt thou change thy glory Richard Le Gallienne [1866 IE FLIGHT OF THE GODDESS y should live in a garret aloof, , when I walked on a rugged way, The narrow, mean attic, I see it now!— Wretched enough was I sometimes, Midnight filled my slumbers with song; But the Delphian airs have died away. I wonder and wonder how it befell: I bade the house-tops a long farewell; 'Good-by," I cried, "to the stars and clouds! "But thou, rare soul, thou hast dwelt with me, Spirit of Poesy! thou divine Breath of the morning, thou shalt be, And the woman I loved was now my bride, Flown, and I fear she will never return; I call-but she does not stoop to my cry; I wait--but she lingers, and ah! so long! It was not so in the years gone by, When she touched my lips with chrism of song. |