Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/405

THE SONGSTER The envious rival near;

Thou hast no fear

Of the day's vogue, the scornful critic's sneer.

Would, O wisest bard, that now

I could cheerly sing as thou!

Would I might chant the thoughts which on me throng

For the very joy of song!

Here, on the written page,

I falter, yearning to impart

The vague and wandering murmur of my heart,

Haply a little to assuage

This human restlessness and pain,

And half forget my chain:

Thou, unconscious of thy cage,

Showerest music everywhere;

Thou hast no care

But to pour out the largesse thou hast won

From the south-wind and the sun;

There are no prison-bars

Betwixt thy tricksy spirit and the stars.

When from its delicate clay

Thy little life shall pass away,

Thou wilt not meanly die,

Nor voiceless yield to silence and decay;

But triumph still in art

And act thy minstrel-part,

Lifting a last, long pæan

To the unventured empyrean.

—So bid the world go by,

And they who list to thee aright,

Seeing thee fold thy wings and fall, shall say:

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