 | Poems by William Wetmore Story |  |
273
THE MIGHTY MAKERS.
I.
Whose are those forms august that, in the pressAnd busy blames and praises of to-day,
Stand so serene above life's fierce affray
With ever youthful strength and loveliness?
Those are the mighty makers, whom no stress
Of time can shame, nor fashion sweep away,
Whom art begot on nature in the play
Of healthy passion, scorning base excess.
Rising perchance in mists, and half obscure
When up the horizon of their age they came,
Brighter with years they shine in steadier light,
Great constellations that will aye endure,
Though myriad meteors of ephemeral fame
Across them flash, to vanish into night.
II.
Such was our Chaucer in the early primeOf English verse, who held to Nature's hand
And walked serenely through its morning land,
Gladsome and hale, brushing its dewy rime.
And such was Shakespeare, whose strong soul could climb
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Of passion's deeps, or over Fancy's strand
Trip with his fairies, keeping step and time.
His, too, the power to laugh out full and clear,
With unembittered joyance, and to move
Along the silent, shadowy paths of love
As tenderly as Dante, whose austere,
Stern spirit through the worlds below, above,
Unsmiling strode, to tell their tidings here.
| Poems by William Wetmore Story | |