 | Collected poems of Herman Melville |  |
Camoens In The Hospital
2 (AFTER)
What now avails the pageant verse,Trophies and arms with music borne?
Base is the world; and some rehearse
How noblest meet ignoble scorn
Vain now the ardor, vain the fire,
Delirium mere, unsound desire:
Fate's knife hath ripped the chorded lyre.
Exhausted by the exacting lay,
Thou dost but fall a surer prey
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While they who work them, fair in face,
Still keep their strength in prudent place,
And claim they worthier run life's race,
Serving high God with useful good.
| Collected poems of Herman Melville | |