Page:The roamer and other poems (1920).djvu/182

172 XXVIII

" evil thing is honor," once of old

The saddest of Italian shepherds sang,

And on his mouth the immortal lyric sprang

That through all ages pours the age of gold:

"Not that the earth untilled her harvests rolled,

The rose no thorn, the serpent had no fang,

The sea no furrow, nowhere ever rang

The battle, but that love was uncontrolled."

The reminiscence of all lost desire

That love-defrauded hearts dream on for aye,

Hangs in the words, and rises from the lyre,

Whose ecstasy fails not unto this day.

O Song of Gold! O all-consuming fire!

Victorious flame! O lover-hearted lay!