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TO AUSTIN DOBSON
Laureate of the Gentle Heart!
Only art like your own art,
Limpid, gracious, happy-phrased,
Could praise you as you should be praised.
Many a lyric you have writ,
Grave with pathos, gay with wit,
Or conceived in larger mood,
Shall outlast the clattering brood
That usurp our noisy day;
Shall, with all that's noble, stay
In our well-loved English tongue
Till the ending song is sung;
For no purer tone was heard
Since men sought Beauty and the Word.
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