Mightiest-minded of the Roman race,
Lucretius!
In thy predestined, purgatory place,
Where thou and thine Iphigenia wait:
What think'st thou of the Vision and the Fate,
Wherewith the Christ makes all thine outcries vain?
Art learning Christ through sweet and bitter pain,
Lucretius?
Heaviest-hearted of the sons of men,
Lucretius!
Well couldst thou justify severe thoughts then,
Considering thy lamentable Rome:
But thou wilt come to an imperial home,
With walls of jasper, past the walls of fire:
To God's proud City, and thine heart's desire,
Lucretius!
1887.