It settles softly on your things, Impalpable, fine, light, dull, gray: Her dingy dust-clout Betty brings, And singing brushes it away: And it ’s a queen’s robe, once so proud, And it ’s the moths fed in its fold, It ’s leaves, and roses, and the shroud Wherein an ancient saint was rolled. And it is Beauty’s golden hair, And it is Genius’ crown of bay, And it is lips once warm and fair That kissed in some forgotten May.…
The sun looked from his everlasting skies, He laughed into my daily-dying eyes; He said to me, the brutal shining Sun: “Poor, fretful, hot, rebellious, little one! “Thou shalt not find it, yet there shall be truth; Thou shalt grow old, but yet there shall be youth; Thou shalt not do, yet great...
It settles softly on your things, Impalpable, fine, light, dull, gray: Her dingy dust-clout Betty brings, And singing brushes it away: And it ’s a queen’s robe, once so proud, And it ’s the moths fed in its fold, It ’s leaves, and roses, and the shroud Wherein an ancient saint was rolled...
How shall we tell an angel From another guest? How, from the common worldly herd, One of the blest? Hint of suppressed halo, Rustle of hidden wings, Wafture of heavenly frankincense,— Which of these things? The old Sphinx smiles so subtly: “I give no golden rule,— Yet would I warn thee...
