POETRY.
A PLEA.
I.
0 YE iu all the world. who love true Song, Be gentle to the Singers who uplift In innocent delight a cradle gift,— So often found to work them fatal wrong. Judge them not wholly as the tuneless throng, But if within their instrument a rift Be found. to mar not music, give it shrift,— Song justifies itself, if sweet and strong.
Song justifies itself, but they who sing, Raining etherial music from a height Lonely and pure, grow strong upon the wing, And. more and more enamoured of the light But faint for any earthly journeying, And fain to seek a lowly bed. at night. IL And oh ! be tenderest to the seers who lack The wild-bird's song, the wild-bird's wing to rise, And bathe their souls in light of summer skies,— Poets who gather truth with bonded back, And give forth speech of it as on the rack ; Speech urgent as the blood of grapes that dyes His garments who must tread it out with sighs, And ceaseless feet that follow no fair track.
Think of the manful work of those who bruise The grape in setting free its life divine, And if some favour they should thereby lose, Count it no marvel that a soul should pine, Which often for its sustenance must use But dregs of that it pours thee forth as wine.
Words that are idle with the songless crowd Are as the Poet's ripest deed, the fruit And flower of all his working days, the suit He weaves about his seal, which, if endowed 'Too richly, and so called to ends more proud, Builds with his breath a house of high repute, Wherein he chants the office for the mute, Appealing ones, who at his feet are bowed.
Yet let the Maker mould them as he will, A. spirit that he knows not to control Works in his words beyond his utmost skill, Making them yield his measure, and the whole Form of his being, be it good or ill,— . For no man's work is greater than his soul.
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