Yes, I Answered You Last

The Critics Could Never Mortify Me Out Of Heart - Because I Love Poetry For Its Own Sake, - And, Tho' With No Stoicism And Some Ambition, Care More For My Poems Than For My Poetic Reputation.

And Chaucer, With His Infantine Familiar Clasp Of Things Divine.

And Lilies Are Still Lilies, Pulled By Smutty Hands, Though Spotted From Their White.

But The Child's Sob Curses Deeper In The Silence Than The Strong Man In His Wrath!

With Stammering Lips And Insufficient Sound I Strive And Struggle To Deliver Right The Music Of My Nature.