Lies dumb and knows not how it shall rejoice.

I am most weary of the petulant songs I sing,

Most tired of tunes that only learn to weep,

And long to turn my dreams from their pale sleep

Into a gentle minstrelsy with harp of silver string;

To fashion for my love one perfect verse

Symmetrically threaded by beauty word on word,

Flowing and flashing like the luted laughter of a bird

To bless the soul with music which I ravished with a curse.

But as a coward in the general gloom