William Morton Payne

  • Strain, strain thine eyes, this parting is for aye!
    Grief have her will of thee! Thy faith confessed
    To his unequal, he must go, the quest
    Fulfilled that brought him hither on thy day
    Of imminent, direst peril. Now away
    To other shores bids him the Grail’s...

  • Sin-satiate, and haggard with despair,
    Freed from the unholy mountain’s baleful spell,
    Forth coming from the very pit of Hell,
    The fallen knight repentant kneels in prayer.
    But hark! what solemn strains fill all the air?
    What pilgrim chants now on the...

  • Not merely for our pleasure, but to purge
    The soul from baseness, from ignoble fear,
    And all the passions that make dim the clear
    Calm vision of the world; our feet to urge
    On to ideal far-set goals; to merge
    Our being with the heart of things; brought...

  • What time the earth takes on the garb of Spring,
    And new-born joy runs riot in the blood,
    When the year’s tide turns refluent to its flood,
    And blissful birds their songs are carolling,—
    When life once more is fair, and everything
    In nature smiles, when...