"Touch him ne'er so lightly"

"Touch him ne'er so lightly, into song he broke: Soil so quick-receptive, — not one feather-seed, Not one flower-dust fell but straight its fall awoke Vitalizing virtue: song would song succeed Sudden as spontaneous — prove a poet-soul!" Indeed? Rock's the song-soil rather, surface hard and bare: Sun and dew their mildness, storm and frost their rage Vainly both expend, — few flowers awaken there: Quiet in its cleft broods — what the after-age Knows and names a pine, a nation's heritage.