THE GENIUS OF POETRY

    That genius or that talent that resides
    In each of us and secretly confides
    What our vocation is, how we are called
    To serve the world or otherwise be stalled
    In our misguided efforts to succeed,
    Intends our gifts to serve some urgent need.

    What need then is fulfilled by poetry
    Unless to show that ingenuity
    With words and sounds can first delight and then
    Enlighten by the wielding of a pen—
    That strokes of genius may be deftly made
    As much as when a violin is played

         Yet more, because this sound is also sense:
         A poem may have wisdom to dispense.

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