Page:Selections from the American poets (IA selectamerpoet00bryarich).pdf/133

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Fitz-Greene Halleck.
129
Not so his memory, for whose sake My bosom bore thee far and long,His—who a humbler flower could make Immortal as his song.
The memory of Burns—a name That calls, when brimm'd her festal cup,A nation's glory, and her shame, In silent sadness up.
A nation's glory—be the rest Forgot—she's canonized his mind;And it is joy to speak the best We may of human kind.
I've stood beside the cottage bed Where the Bard-peasant first drew breath:A straw-thatch'd roof above his head, A straw-wrought couch beneath.
And I have stood beside the pile, His monument—that tells to HeavenThe homage of earth's proudest isle To that Bard-peasant given!
Bid thy thoughts hover o'er that spot, Boy-Minstrel, in thy dreaming hour;And know, however low his lot, A Poet's pride and power.
The pride that lifted Burns from earth, The power that gave a child of songAscendancy o'er rank and birth, The rich, the brave, the strong;
And if despondency weigh down Thy spirit's fluttering pinions then,Despair—thy name is written on The roll of common men.
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