Never a stalk of the Summer
Dreams of its mission and doom:
Only to hasten the Comer --
Martyrdom unto the Bloom.
Ever the Mighty Chooser
Plucks when the fruit is ripe,
Scorning the mass and letting it pass,
Keen for the cryptic type.
Greece in her growing season
Troubled the lands and seas,
Plotted and fought and suffered and wrought --
Building a Sophocles!
Only a faultless temple
Stands for the vassal's groan;
The harlot's strife and the faith of the wife
Blend in a graven stone.
Ne'er do the stern gods cherish
The hope of the million lives;
Always the Fact shall perish
And only the Truth survives.
Gardens of roses wither,
Shaping the perfect rose:
And the poet's song shall live for the long,
Dumb, aching years of prose.