I. <br /> <br />THREE MEN lived yet when this dead man was young <br />Whose names and words endure for ever one: <br />Whose eyes grew dim with straining toward the sun, <br />And his wings weakened, and his angel’s tongue <br />Lost half the sweetest song was ever sung, <br />But like the strain half uttered earth hears none, <br />Nor shall man hear till all men’s songs are done: <br />One whose clear spirit like an eagle hung <br />Between the mountains hallowed by his love <br />And the sky stainless as his soul above: <br />And one the sweetest heart that ever spake <br />The brightest words wherein sweet wisdom smiled. <br />These deathless names by this dead snake denied <br />Bid memory spit upon him for their sake. <br /> <br /> <br /> <br />II. <br /> <br />Sweet heart, forgive me for thine own sweet sake, <br />Whose kind blithe soul such seas of sorrow swam, <br />And for my love’s sake, powerless as I am <br />For love to praise thee, or like thee to make <br />Music of mirth where hearts less pure would break, <br />Less pure than thine, our life-unspotted Lamb. <br />Things hatefullest thou hadst not heart to damn, <br />Nor wouldst have set thine heel on this dead snake. <br />Let worms consume its memory with its tongue, <br />The fang that stabbed fair Truth, the lip that stung <br />Men’s memories uncorroded with its breath. <br />Forgive me, that with bitter words like his <br />I mix the gentlest English name that is, <br />The tenderest held of all that know not death.<br /><br />Algernon Charles Swinburne<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/after-looking-into-carlyles-reminiscences/
