XXII
’Twas here that from the church and nature rose
The English stage, when he, the stable-groom,
Should write the Drama of Humanity,—
The greatest poet of all history,
Who mingled laughter with the deepest gloom,
Life’s music with its sterner prose.
The modern drama,—modern Ishmael,
Begotten of religion; like a youth,
Fair, myrtle-crowned, and slender, innocent,
With dancing measures upon pleasure bent;
Then cast away by “guardians of the truth,”
And, homeless, nourished at the secret well.
And when his great Emancipator came,
He dared to dance and frisk on country lanes,
But not in London town (his mother’s there);
Until the king of poesy laid bare
His ancient birthright, lost ’mongst Grecian manes,
Then waxed he strong and daily gained in fame,
And found a home within the city wall,
Where still he dwells, and ever will abide,
In his duplicity, since life is very double,
A-laughing, crying, at its fleeting bubble,
Appearing on the restless ocean-tide,
In morning splendor, or dusk even-fall.
Still Ishmael, to Sarah’s first begotten,
Still preached against by heaven’s best elect,
And he returns, at times, with taunts and gibes;
But if they put away some modern scribes,
And did great Shakespeare’s drama resurrect,
Our modern stage would not be half as rotten.
Regenerated, cleansed, what ally this
To all that’s true and noble under heaven!
A mirror of ourselves? Much more! A vision
Of life’s ideal, and its highest mission,
And though the weary heart must mirth be given,
The thrill of truth’s clear gleam is better bliss.
So, let the true born help the quondam alien,
They need each other in their common quest
For happiness, the rainbow’s pot of gold,
And let the secret of the quest be told
By each, in love, that each may do his best
To lift and cheer, where life is low and failing.