TO SHAKESPEARE LONGER than thine, than thine, Is now my time of life; and thus thy years Seem to be clasped and harboured within mine. O how ignoble this my clasp appears! Thy unprophetic birth, Thy darkling death: living I might have seen That cradle, marked those labours, closed that earth. O first, O last, O infinite between! Now that my life has shared Thy dedicated date, O mortal, twice, To what all-vain embrace shall be compared My lean enclosure of thy paradise: To ignorant arms that fold A poet to a foolish breast? The Line, That is not, with the world within its hold? So, days with days, my days encompass thine. Child, Stripling, Man -- the sod. Might I talk little language to thee, pore On thy last silence? O thou city of God, My waste lies after thee, and lies before. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SLUG IN WOODS by EARL (EARLE) BIRNEY THE RIVER OF LIFE by THOMAS CAMPBELL ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE by THOMAS GRAY THE LOW-BACKED CAR by SAMUEL LOVER LINES TO A BEAUTIFUL AND BUS-RIDING LADY by FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS PEARLS OF THE FAITH: 10. AL-JABBAR by EDWIN ARNOLD UMBRAE PUELLULARUM by WILLIAM ROSE BENET THE GOLDEN ODES OF PRE-ISLAMIC ARABIA: IBN KOLTHUM by WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT |