'YES, let Art go, if it must be <br />That with it men must starve — <br />If Music, Painting, Poetry <br />Spring from the wasted hearth!' <br />Yes, let Art go, till once again <br />Through fearless heads and hands <br />The toil of millions and the pain <br />Be passed from out the lands: <br />Till from the few their plunder falls <br />To those who've toiled and earned <br />But misery's hopeless intervals <br />From those who've robbed and spurned. <br />Yes, let Art go, without a fear, <br />Like Autumn flowers we burn, <br />For, with her reawakening year, <br />Be sure she will return! — <br />Return, but greater, nobler yet <br />Because her laurel crown <br />With dew and not with blood is wet, <br />And as our Queen sit down!<br /><br />Francis William Lauderdale Adams<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/art-40/
