’Tis in the fatal drooping of the flower,
’Tis in the stubble of the fields and meads,
Where crickets hold a concert day and night,
’Tis in the stormcloud’s shadow and its flight
Across the waters and the sighing reeds,
’Tis in the gold and crimson of the bower.
’Tis in the rain that strikes against the pane
And leaves its diamonds on the bending straw,
’Tis in the mist which follows nightly shower,
A floating mantle of the Morning Hour,
’Tis in the swelling brooks which onward go,
With mystic songs to the majestic main.
And Melancholy is the Truth, said one,
Whose genius pierced through the life of man,
Who hated cant, deriding the Tartuffe,
And saw beneath the robe the devil’s hoof,
A wandering exile from his native land,
The fascinating bard, the great Byron.
Forgive, O, lustrous name, that I should use
Thy music for a lyre so poorly strung!
But I did often in my youth, even now,
Admire the glory of his laurelled brow,
And felt that truth and freedom ne’er was sung,
As by this suff’ring highpriest of the Muse.
O, all ye learned critics of his art,
Who analyze by a mechanic rule,
Ye fail to see the grandeur of his soul,
That soared above the petty and the small,
Indifferent to the existing school,
Preferring Pegasus to any cart.
With the sublime he ever was in tune,
’Mid Alpen heights, or on “the boundless deep,”
Or ’mid the storm and deaf’ning thunders crash,
In darkest night, lit by the lightning’s flash,
Or on the plains where vanished empires sleep,
Time’s desolation ’neath a waning moon.
His harp did catch the minor music’s flow
From nature’s heart and human tragedy,
And when he laughed it was the cynic’s smile,
Though he at heart was tender as a child,
But death to him had sweeter harmony,
Than life’s brief dream with its relentless woe.
Likewise Sordino, after years of thinking,
Found in the dirge the acme of his search,
The home-call to a truer life’s beginning,
When man shall cease from sorrow and from sinning,
The great, the final welcome of the church,
The note of peace which heav’n to earth is linking.
VIII
At length there came upon Sordino’s city
An enemy with armies great and strong,
And laid a siege about its buttressed walls,
And since the strongest bulwark sometime falls
Before a cannonading fierce, and long,
So did its self-defences, without pity.