Page:Florence Earle Coates Poems 1898 111.jpg

 ART

stood a vision vestureless and fair,

Glowing the canvas with her orient grace:

A goddess grave she stood, with such a face

As in Elysium the immortals wear.

But some, unworthy, as they pondered there,

Cold to the marvel of her look divine—

Saw but a form undraped, in Beauty's shrine.

Then she, it seemed, rebuked them: "Old and young

Have worshiped at the temple where I breathe,

And deathless laurels, for my sake, enwreathe

The brows of him from whose pure thought I sprung:

Lips consecrate as yours his praise have sung,—

Who neither sued for praise nor courted ease,

But reverently wrought, as from his knees.

"No raiment can the base or mean reclaim,

And that which sacred is must sacred be,

Clothed but in rags or robed in modesty.

In the endeavor still is felt the aim:

The workman may by skill exalt his name, 111