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Title: Criticus
Author: James Avis Bartley [
More Titles by Bartley]
The Southern Muse--so long with drooping wing,--
The Southern Muse, alas! too sad to sing--
Her fair head drooped and dim her mournful eye,
While pitying breezes sighed in sorrow by,--
At last--at last--a wondrous friend has found,
Whose power shall make her through all time renowned:
Oh! now to her what magic shall belong,
To charm the nations with a peerless song!
Hail Criticus! thou marvel of the age!
Oh! thou wilt fire her with a noble rage!
Oh! thou her song wilt kindly patronize,
And make her honored in the nation's eyes.
Oh! glorious vision which transports my soul,
While thoughts of triumph through my bosom roll;
The Goddess comes, she brightly smiles once more,
Nor sadly sighs, as long she sighed of yore;
Her breath the fragrance of the Southern grove,
Her voice the voice of victory and of love;--
Approaching proudly now, with sweetest strain,
Greets Criticus, her godsire--but in vain.
How modest! Criticus! thou wilt not wear
A single honor--nobler is thy care--
Thou wilt not, merely, reign the Muse's sire;
But thou wilt sometimes woo her willing lyre!
Earth! hear that song! The strains that softly sweep
From mermaid's shell, across the moonlit deep--
The tones of visions which have only dwelt
In that deep bosom which has wildly felt--
Those notes like far off music from the plain,
Where grief nor hate can e'er be known again--
That haunt the spirit 'midst this lower sphere,
And wake the dreamer's ever faithful tear--
How die away in saddest silence all
Those strains, O Criticus! when thou dost--"squall!"
Sagacious Criticus! no witling's wit,
Compares with thine, or durst compare with it.
How could Parnassus rise in days of yore,
Ere thou had'st taught the clumsy rocks to soar?
How could the muses in their ambient bower,
In loftiest lays, anticipate thy power!
How could the sparkling Helicon flow free,
How durst it ripple, and not wait for thee?
No business had the Stagyrite to name
The rules of verse; old Homer was to blame,
For laying out too soon the Iliad's plan;
Homer was nothing but a "blind, old man!"
Light, light that Ajax prayed for, now has come,
And poetasters hence may read their doom!
O Grant us, sweetly, Grant, thy gentle roar,
And pigs shall squeal, and asses bray no more![1]
Great Criticus! illustrious lord of song!
To thee a double wreath shall e'er belong:
The Critics' cypress and the Poet's bay
Shall twine in love to deck thy brow for aye;
For far o'er Dunciad's heroes shall thou reign,
And ne'er shalt lose that honored seat again.
And still, while future ages roll along,
Our Southern minstrels to thy court shall throng;
There lowly fall, and humbly beg thee grant
The sweet reward of their melodious chant;
A verdant laurel for each beaming brow,
To bloom through ages, as it bloometh now--
Or, if thou frown, receive thy chastening rod,
Thou, Bard's Maecenas, and thou Poet's god!
[Footnote 1: 16 lines above were written by Prof. E. Longley.]
[The end]
James Avis Bartley's poem: Criticus
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