Ii

Not to be granted great, Not to be crowned in youth, His soul is passionate With anger for the truth.

He feels the spirit-drouth, He seeks the mad emprise To mock the mocking mouth And smite the lips of lies.

Not his the happy guile To veil the flinching eye, Here where we sit and smile To hear each other lie.

But ours to live, forsooth; We keep a decent face And seize the skirts of truth And skip into a place;

With bearded wisdom thence Our noble plan unfold For gathering good—pretence Indeed for gathering gold.

But he—he cannot rise; He slowly falls apart; For all these human lies Are needles in his heart.

He has the truth, he thinks; He shivers in his rags; The laughing liar chinks His bursting money-bags

Of lie-begotten pelf, And climbs the ladder of lies To fortune—for himself, And not for wisdom, wise.

We crown the charlatan; But show to him who shapes A priceless work for man The gratitude of apes.

So one with toil hath writ The work which is his life. Being poor, he has no wit; His reader is his wife;

They live in direst need; No fortunate patron shows The work for men to read; He dies, and no one knows.

A jealous rival burns The work he will not save; The buried poet turns And mutters in his grave.