UNLIKE are we, unlike, O princely Heart! Unlike our uses and our destinies. Our ministering two angels look surprise On one another, as they strike athwart Their wings in passing. Thou, bethink thee, art A guest for queens to social pageantries, With gages from a hundred brighter eyes Than tears even can make mine, to play thy part Of chief musician. What hast thou to do With looking from the lattice-lights at me, A poor, tired, wandering singer, singing through The dark, and leaning up a cypress tree? The chrism is on thine head, -- on mine, the dew, -- And Death must dig the level where these agree. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BALLAD OF WILLIAM SYCAMORE (1790-1880) by STEPHEN VINCENT BENET DAFFY-DOWN-DILLY [OR, DAFFYDOWNDILLY] by MOTHER GOOSE TO A FRIEND WHOSE WORK HAS COME TO NOTHING by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS THE MORAL FABLES: THE FOX, THE WOLF, AND THE CADGER by AESOP THE BIRDS: THE HYMN OF THE BIRDS by ARISTOPHANES |