Page:The Man Who Died Twice (1924).djvu/51

 To a discreet humility in others,

I doubt if in the scorn he flung to us,

Mostly in silence, his preoccupation

Saw crumbs of any nurture less assuaging

Than wholesome and unfrosted honesty;

Albeit his arrogance may have merited

The few vindictive nippings that amazed

As much as they annoyed, and would have seemed

Allegiance, had their negligible venom

Been isolated from another virus,

Which later was to be a leprosy

Of self-contempt attending revelation.

When he had heard the last stroke of those clocks,

And called himself again the last hard name

That his abundant lexicon released,

He tore those two initial symphonies