A PARTICULAR EPILOGUE

for Walter S. Phelan

Ther was a gentil SCHOLAR clepéd Steve,
Who laboured that his pupils might beleve
That Dame Nature, aboven alle goddes,
The keeper of this Erthe where each man ploddes,
Sholde worshipped be and honoured all the daye
In bothe hir goodly businesse and hir playe.
And thereto did he teche the poet Walt
(Whose nam he shared), whose boké was a vault
Of sacred wisdom writ to make men whole,
A poet of the body and the soule:
He saw a leve of grasse the journeywerke
Of starres and made himselve its blisful clerke.
In Geoffrey and in Walt, Steve comprehended
The widé world, long ere his werke was ended.

*