Classic Poem

Of old the gracious gods from Heaven descended,
In hands immortal bearing costly gifts,
With man his daily toilsome pathways wended,
Shed solemn radiance in transfiguring drifts,
Radiance of Heaven's midsun,
On all things thought or done,
With might divine man against men defended,
From wrong that slays the laboring truth that lifts.

They taught to cleave with prow the unmeasured ocean,
To harvest wave-ridged fields where foam-flowers grow,
To count Time's all-prevailing pulse and motion,
The spirit's deepmost mysteries to know,
To tend the sprouting grain,
To rear on brown-hued plain
The splendid symbol of the heart's devotion,
With cities populous the land to sow.

They built much-trodden roads to realms ideal,
And peopled with their oracles the air,
Uniting in relation hymeneal
Man's hope and all the fruitful earth did bear,
So that his visionings
On splendor-dropping wings
Haunted each vale and glade, and changed the real
To visible image of his dreams most fair.

Therefore in woods where summer lingered playing,
Making her footsteps sweet with grass and flower,
Where pleasure circled swart Silenus straying,
Where Bacchus slept in rose-illumined bower,
And dryads trod the green,
And shy soft-eyed were seen
Slim nymphs and oreads going blithe a-Maying,
Midas, the king, occasion found and hour.

For him, Silenus—who, afar from joyance
The wine-god's merry crew made in that gloom,
Had wandered, and in bacchant mazed annoyance
Pondered of satyr lost the imminent doom—
For guerdon of kind care,
And conduct safe to where
The grieving master stayed the revel's buoyance,
Set in the space the glad god's smiles illume.

And Bacchus all King Midas' askings granted,
Giving him power to change to virgin gold
All things in which his mystic touch implanted
The virtue magical his hand did hold;
A shallow boon, indeed,
Born of material greed,
Of fortunate sequence in due period scanted,
A fool's desire that scorn and grief unfold.

But, in these latter days, in joys ethereal
The gods sit on their thrones, forgetting men;
Void is the earth of all their songs imperial,
Void is each forest deep and rose-clad glen,
Void is the chainless air,
Void are the spaces fair
With immemorial march of worlds sidereal,
Mute are those tones to earthly denizen.

Sometimes sweet companies from the dim spacious
Plains of the Heavens descend the flushing light,
Circle young hopes with halos warm and gracious,
Strengthen travailing thought with spiritual might,
Flit before children's eyes,
Paint the gold sunrise skies,
Gladden deep-grieving hearts with dreams veracious,
And cheer brave souls upholding struggling right.

But momentary is the golden vision;
The level winds upbear not long the feet
Treading secure their waves as fields elysian.
For one tranced interval the soft wings beat,
And tones sweet as Love's voice
Bid the worn soul rejoice,
Then night or daylight stares in grim derision
On emptied homes and spectre-peopled street.

One god remains man's friend, gold-haired Apollo,
Mindful of shepherd days when Time was young,
Sad with man's woe, sad with the gladness hollow
The Fates for world around his soul have hung;
He knows the burdened heart,
The clamorous, fruitless part
Of hope bemocked with dream it cannot follow,
Of mind in anxious dubitation swung.

Therefore, as Bacchus erst in forests olden,
He gave a gift, but universal, pure;
The gift to change to substance spiritual-golden,
The shows and forms of all man's life obscure;
No selfish, thoughtless boon,
But power to set in tune
The wide world-chaos age on age beholden,
To build the harmonious sphere that shall perdure.

Therein the passionate sea's deep-throated mystery,
The high-domed laugh of cloudless mid-day sky,
The light of stars, and weird, unspoken history
Stream-cloven caves through all their darkness sigh,
The calms of summit snows
Flushed with the sunset rose,
And voice of summer's breeze-bent flower consistory,
Furnish the feast whereby the soul will lie.

Therein the soul in sovereignty pure and regal
Sceptres the elemental powers at will,
Haunts thought's sea-spaces like a spirit sea-gull,
Hearkens what songs the empyrean fill,
Feels through its spirit limbs
Thrill Love's mysterious hymns,
Spreads its broad wings and soars like sun-born eagle,
To God's sun-temple crowning God's steep hill.

Therein the nations in firm friendship banded,
Travelling the centuries loud with rapturous song,
Past the vexed rocks where ancient peoples stranded,
Secure from war and hatred's poisonous wrong,
One body, one wide heart,
To earth's remotest part,
One great world-giant, conquer Fate, and landed
On greener shores the pastoral times prolong.

Therein the One supreme, the ineffable glory,
The soul of love and substance pure of good,
The infinite might and world-embracing story,
The life of stream and singing-bird and wood,
The trumpet of the storm,
The light whose beams inform
Rapt thought and wisdom with much travail hoary,
Serenely smiles in measureless fatherhood.

O lord Apollo, thee, by night and daytime
Singing we praise and long with thee to be;
Clear as the silver stars at night's mid play-time,
Thou comest that work-wearied men may see;
At autumn's fruitful tide,
By winter's bright fireside,
In rose-draped summer, and in chaster May-time,
We sing the gladness that is still with thee.