You and I would rather read that volume
(Taken to his beating bosom by it),
20Lean and list the bosom-beats of Rafael,
Would we not? than wonder at Madonnas—
Her, San Sisto names, and Her, Foligno,
Her, that visits Florence in a vision,
Her, that's left with lilies in the Louvre—
Seen by us and all the world in circle.
IV
You and I will never read that volume.
°[27][Guido] Reni,° like his own eye's apple,
Guarded long the treasure-book and loved it.[page 226]
Guido Reni dying, all Bologna
30Cried, and the world cried too, "Ours, the treasure!"
Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished.
V
°[32][Dante]° once prepared to paint an angel:
°[33]Whom to please? You whisper "Beatrice."°
While he mused and traced it and retraced it
(Peradventure with a pen corroded
Still by drops of that hot ink he dipped for,
°[37][When], his left-hand i' the hair o' the wicked,°
Back he held the brow and pricked its stigma,
Bit into the live man's flesh for parchment,
40Loosed him, laughed to see the writing rankle,
Let the wretch go festering through Florence)—
Dante, who loved well because he hated,
Hated wickedness that hinders loving,
Dante, standing, studying his angel,—
°[45][In] there broke the folk of his Inferno.°
Says he—"Certain people of importance"
(Such he gave his daily dreadful line to)
"Entered and would seize, forsooth, the poet."
Says the poet—"Then I stopped my painting."
[page 227]
VI
50You and I would rather see that angel,
Painted by the tenderness of Dante,
Would we not?—than read a fresh Inferno.
VII
You and I will never see that picture.
While he mused on love and Beatrice,
While he softened o'er his outlined angel,
In they broke, those "people of importance":
°[57][We] and Bice° bear the loss forever.