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| THOU, who wouldst wear the name | |
| Of poet mid thy brethren of mankind, | |
| And clothe in words of flame | |
| Thoughts that shall live within the general mind! | |
| Deem not the framing of a deathless lay | 5 |
| The pastime of a drowsy summer day. | |
| |
| But gather all thy powers, | |
| And wreak them on the verse that thou dost weave, | |
| And in thy lonely hours, | |
| At silent morning or at wakeful eve, | 10 |
| While the warm current tingles through thy veins, | |
| Set forth the burning words in fluent strains. | |
| |
| No smooth array of phrase, | |
| Artfully sought and ordered though it be, | |
| Which the cold rhymer lays | 15 |
| Upon his page with languid industry, | |
| Can wake the listless pulse to livelier speed, | |
| Or fill with sudden tears the eyes that read. | |
| |
| The secret wouldst thou know | |
| To touch the heart or fire the blood at will? | 20 |
| Let thine own eyes o’erflow; | |
| Let thy lips quiver with the passionate thrill; | |
| Seize the great thought, ere yet its power be past, | |
| And bind, in words, the fleet emotion fast. | |
| |
| Then should thy verse appear | 25 |
| Halting and harsh, and all unaptly wrought, | |
| Touch the crude line with fear, | |
| Save in the moment of impassioned thought; | |
| Then summon back the original glow, and mend | |
| The strain with rapture that with fire was penned. | 30 |
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| Yet let no empty gust | |
| Of passion find an utterance in thy lay, | |
| A blast that whirls the dust | |
| Along the howling street and dies away; | |
| But feelings of calm power and mighty sweep, | 35 |
| Like currents journeying through the windless deep. | |
| |
| Seek’st thou, in living lays, | |
| To limn the beauty of the earth and sky? | |
| Before thine inner gaze | |
| Let all that beauty in clear vision lie; | 40 |
| Look on it with exceeding love, and write | |
| The words inspired by wonder and delight. | |
| |
| Of tempests wouldst thou sing, | |
| Or tell of battles—make thyself a part | |
| Of the great tumult; cling | 45 |
| To the tossed wreck with terror in thy heart; | |
| Scale, with the assaulting host, the rampart’s height, | |
| And strike and struggle in the thickest fight. | |
| |
| So shalt thou frame a lay | |
| That haply may endure from age to age, | 50 |
| And they who read shall say: | |
| “What witchery hangs upon this poet’s page! | |
| What art is his the written spells to find | |
| That sway from mood to mood the willing mind!” | |
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