A Mournful Ode in the Manner of Thomas Gray
On the Peculiar Life of One Who Dreamed of Light
Beneath the yew where shadows crowd the sod,
A humble man lies mute, unknown to fame;
No laurel wreath, no scholar’s learned nod
Adorns the stone that bears his modest name.
Yet mark his tale, ye proud of lofty birth,
Whose sires are writ in annals brazen-bound:
He came of stock from Belgia’s troubled earth,
And bore the shame of accents soft in sound.
The youngest sprout in dame’s imperious shade,
Where Mother's voice, a gale that ne’er grew still,
With tales inflated, proud and overweighed,
Bent his green soul to others' louder will.
She spoke of knights and blood from Charlemagne,
Though brewers lined the tree from whence he came;
He, bashful, watched and feared to stake a claim
On dreams too bold, or gifts too great to name.
His consort, saintly, once of Protestant fire,
Embraced the incense, beads, and Latin tongue;
For truth she burned, with beauty did aspire,
And in the ancient Mass her spirit sung.
Though oft she wept with fevered brow and pain,
Her days in patience lit his darker skies;
Her faith the lamp, her goodness still remained
Though doctors passed, and hope itself grew shy.
Meanwhile he toiled in silence with a scheme—
A theory strange, to summon force from naught;
To draw from ether man’s electric dream,
And grant the globe the fire Prometheus sought.
He scribbled late by candle’s dying breath,
While round him danced the children of his line;
A hundred-fifty bore his blood till death—
A tree prodigious in its bold design.
But still he shrank from halls of learned pride,
And stammered low of all his high pursuits;
For in his heart, some chiding voice would chide
That worth from Belgian roots not oft takes fruits.
Ah! who shall sing the might of meek despair,
The light that burns in souls the world denies?
Let not the grave such secret virtues snare,
Nor genius, cloaked in doubt, unhonoured lie.
The village bell tolls slow its evening chime,
The blackbird calls, the harvest moon ascends;
Here rests a man unlauded in his time,
Yet in God's truth and beauty made amends.
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