Dear Poet of Hope! who hast charmed us so long <br />With thy strains of home-music, sweet, solemn, and strong; <br />Now, smooth as the stream when 'tis chained and at rest, <br />And the hues of the sky lie like flowers on its breast,— <br />Now sweeping in glory and might on its way, <br />And now struggling from shadows and darkness to day. <br />Oh, leave not the haunts most propitious to song, <br />For the city's wild strife and the jar of the throng!— <br />Though the freshness of feeling that prompted in youth <br />Thy heart-stirring measures hath died; and the truth <br />That is shrined in the soul when life's voyage is begun, <br />May be something impaired ere the haven be won; <br />Though the visions have fled that gave light to thy spring, <br />And thy heart and thy harp each is wanting a string; <br />Like the leaves on the tree that no tempest may kill, <br />There are feelings unwithered that cling to thee still! <br />Alas, that a poet, so gifted, should leave <br />Life's green vale of repose, 'mid the many to weave <br />Lays that cannot but breathe of the source whence they spring; <br />How unlike the wild wood-notes he once used to sing! <br />What marvel his Muse's strong pinion should sink, <br />If so turbid the waters her spirit must drink; <br />Can we wonder her plumage should lose its proud dyes, <br />If she trails on the earth what was formed for the skies! <br />No; the Poet's a star that shines brightest apart; <br />Let him revel at will in the world of the heart, <br />But the moment he strives mid the crush of the throng, <br />Like a bird too much handled he loses his song; <br />And the fools who once worshipped his light from afar, <br />Are the first to proclaim him no longer a star!<br /><br />Alaric Alexander Watts<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-remonstrance-to-the-poet-campbell-on-proposing-to-take-up-his-permanent-residence-in-london/
