Praise! light and dew of the sweet leaves
Around the Poet's temples hung,
How turned to gall, and how profaned
By envious or by idle tongue!
Given by vapid fools, who laud
Only if others do the same;
Forgotten even while the breath
Is on the air that bears your name.
And He! what was his fate, the bard,
He of the Desert Harp, whose song
Flowed freely, wildly, as the wind
That bore him and his harp along?
That fate which waits the gifted one,
To pine, each finer impulse check'd;
At length to sink, and die beneath
The shade and silence of neglect.
And this the polished age, that springs
The Phoenix from dark years gone by,
That blames and mourns the past, yet leaves
Her warrior and her bard to die.
To die in poverty and pride,
The light of hope and genius past,
Each feeling wrung, until the heart
Could bear no more, so broke at last.
Thus withering amid the wreck
Of sweet hopes, high imaginings,
What can the Minstrel do, but die,
Cursing his too beloved strings!—L. E. L.
