 | Vigil and vision |  |
POPULARITY.
TO him, who seeks what is not bought or sold,Who will not bow the neck in servitude
Nor pander to the unthinking multitude,
Approof comes seldom till his bones are cold,
Or, at the least, until he waxeth old,
Till hope is dead and may not be renewed
And all that life can show of fair and good
Dead leaves and ashes grown, like elfin gold.
So to the poet popularity,
Denied in youth and given when on the wane
Are life and hope, is like the promised fee,
So long withheld and paid at last in vain,
That damned Mehmóud to all eternity,
The gifts that crossed Firdausi's funeral train.
| Vigil and vision | |