Once more I long to join the virile race;
For I was blind till now, and now too late
I see the wonder of the commonplace.

"I long to hear men's voices, coarse and wild,
That never knew a poet's wan desire;
I long to hear them, as a little child
Listens to elders grouped about the fire...
To hear them as they mingle grave and gay--
The prudent planning for the week, and then
Amid the tritest gossip of the day,
Quaint, petty talk of merchandise and men.
I crave the usual and homely themes;
The everyday of which no mermaid sings....
These are the fairest fragments of my dreams;
These are the conquering and deathless things."

He ceased; a sudden radiance round him shone,
And all things melted like a phantom wrack.
And as he swept his hands and stood alone
He heard hoarse thunders and the dusk grew black.
Vast tremors shook the world from side to side--
The earth and sky became a monstrous blot...

_And then it seems he woke, and waking, died;
Calling on things that he had long forgot._

FUNERAL HYMN

When Life's gay courage fails at last,
And I grow worse than old--
Though Death puts out my fiery heart,
I never shall grow cold.

For warm is earth's green covering,
And warmly I shall lie,
Wrapped in the winding-sheets of air
And the great, blue folds of sky!

PROTESTS

(_After a Painting by Hugo Ballin_)

Something impelled her from the hearth;
Whispers and winds drew her along;
But still, unconscious of the earth,
She read her book of golden Song.

Old legends stirred her as she read
Of life victoriously unfurled,
Of glories gone but never dead,
And Beauty that redeemed the world.

"Oh Songs," she sighed, "your world was fair;
My own holds no such lovely things;
No glow, no magic anywhere--"
And then, a start--a flash of wings...

And, with the rush of surging seas,
Over her swept the world's replies:
The lyric hills, the buoyant breeze
And all the sudden singing skies!

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Challenge, by Louis Untermeyer

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHALLENGE ***

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