| |
| PICKEN of Beaver Hall, what modest hand, | |
| Or thoughtless, wrote thy sign? ’Bookseller’ thou, | |
| Forsooth! Though goodly word it be, and graced | |
| By learning, honour, men of fair repute. | |
| Not this the operation of thy days, | 5 |
| No barter thought, no views of bank account, | |
| Silver and bills, profit, advertisement; | |
| Not this thy avocation—but to lead | |
| The novice soul along the temple path | |
| To the hid shrine, the thirsty heart to find | 10 |
| Some quenching draft, the world’s delights to lift | |
| Before the unthinking. Gentle Levite thou | |
| Of Art and Wisdom and Humanity | |
| And the inclusive ONE. To thee we fare | |
| To meet the souls of poets, and converse | 15 |
| With sages, known or called from quarters strange | |
| By thy skilled wand. That unpretentious door | |
| Leads where wise Plato visits still the earth, | |
| And Shakespeare calls his airy host to view: | |
| Ah, what a world is there, delectable, | 20 |
| Serene, of perfect grace, the land of Thought! | |
| There in their kingly ranks the Masters walk | |
| By crocus-edged Cephisus’ sleepless stream | |
| Along the cypress paths. There Socrates, | |
| Virgil and Zarathustra, Francis mild, | 25 |
| Memline and Angelo and Angelico, | |
| The bard of Faust and he of Paradise— | |
| Heroes and saints innumerable appear, | |
| While in their converse he who will takes part | |
| And thou art friend and guide. Assuredly | 30 |
| ’Tis blessed to be thus amid a world | |
| Mad after fruit of ashes, running fast | |
| Because the rest are running, blind and deaf | |
| And needing quiet voices like to thine. | |
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