FAME.
Fame, fame—thou warrior's wish, thou poet's thought,
Thou bright delusion; like the rainbow thou
Glitterest, yet none may touch thee; thing of naught,
Star-high with heaven's own brightness on thy brow,
Blazoned and glorious I beheld thee grow—
Vision, begone,—for I am none of thine.
Of all that fills my heart and fancy now,
From dull oblivion not one word or line
Wilt thou touch with thy light and render it divine.
Even be it so. I sing not for thy smiles—
I sing to keep down sighs and ease the smart
Of care and sadness, and the daily toils
Which crush my soul and trample on my heart.
Far mightier spirits of the inspired art
Are mute and nameless, mid the muse in grief
Calls from the eastern to the western airt,
On tale, tradition, ballad, song, and chief
On thee, to give their names one passage bright and brief.
She calls in vain; like to a shooting star
Their storied rhymes shone brightly in their birth,
And shot a dazzling lustre near and far;
Then darkened, died, as all things else on earth.