BEYOND VERSE

My poetry comes from my head, not heart,
And thus do I prefer to call it “verse”:
If I could put the horse before the cart,
It might be more affecting, if less terse.

So tightly bound by rhythm and by rhyme,
So measured out by merely rational schemes,
It never can ascend to the Sublime
Or hearken to grand elevated dreams.

O, let me summon Pegasus to fly
On “viewless wings of poesy” with me
Upon his back beyond the azure sky
And enter cordial realms of ecstasy.

     My heart exalted thus, my eyes then clear,
     My pen might write a line men can revere.

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