 | Songs of Consolation |  |
1.
I HEAR the unwise assever that poetry is dead,
That song is out of season and singers out of date
And both alike unportioned in this our new estate,
Where nothing worth is reckoned, except it baketh bread,
That, in our age rant-ridden, our day delusion-fed,
Song is a flower of dreamland, that lingers overlate,
A rose, of love that breatheth unto a world of hate,
A bird, that pipes its heart out to ears grown deaf for dread.
That song is out of season and singers out of date
And both alike unportioned in this our new estate,
Where nothing worth is reckoned, except it baketh bread,
That, in our age rant-ridden, our day delusion-fed,
Song is a flower of dreamland, that lingers overlate,
A rose, of love that breatheth unto a world of hate,
A bird, that pipes its heart out to ears grown deaf for dread.
They say that it was welcome, whilst yet the world was new
And men from rhymes, like children, must learn the good and true;
But, now that old our earth is and we its dwellers old,
Plain prose and sober reason suffice to us for guide,
Nor from Life's battle leisure for poetry aside
Have we to turn and hearken its tinkling bells of gold.
And men from rhymes, like children, must learn the good and true;
But, now that old our earth is and we its dwellers old,
Plain prose and sober reason suffice to us for guide,
Nor from Life's battle leisure for poetry aside
Have we to turn and hearken its tinkling bells of gold.
| Songs of Consolation | |