Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By William CranstonLawton

1154 Song, Youth, and Sorrow

LOFTY against our Western dawn uprises Achilles:

He among heroes alone singeth or toucheth the lyre.

Few, and dimmed by grief, are the days that to him are appointed!

Love he shall know but to lose, life but to cast it away.

Dreaming of peace and a bride, he sees not the foes at the portal:

Paris, a traitor to love; Phœbus, accorder of song!

Freely he chose, do ye deem, and clave to the anguish and glory?

Rather the Fates at his birth chose, yet he gladly assents.

Is it a warning that death untimely and bitterest sorrow,

Sorrow in love, and death, follow the children of song?

Yet will the young man’s heart still cling to the choice of Achilles—

Grief, an untimely doom, fame that eternal abides.