Time’s Justice

Alas! we live in days of shame,

That men, inventing some new game

For Pleasure’s fools to idle time,

Are welcomed more than men or rhyme,

And men that master sound or paint;

And Genius must be still content

That, though not heeded now at all-

Great men are seen when their stars fall.

What fools we are!  Here one man tramps

Collecting fossils, eggs or stamps;

Others in that dull, useless state

Of toads that kernel rocks; men great,

Though efforts they do make untold-

As misers make to reach their gold,

When sick and dying- could not wake

One thought in these for Beauty’s sake.

The great man’s work, when his life’s past,

Will ripen like plucked fruit at last;

So let not Genius fear but what

Time will do justice to his lot,

And give no more or less; in sooth,

The world could not feel half the truth

If Genius had no power to see

One step beyond reality.

Take you no fear but Time is just;

He’ll not give Genius to the dust,

With soul and common body joined;

You great man, now deemed mad of mind,

Scorned and abused like some white crow

That comes to make white feathers show

Inside a black crows’ rookery-

Courage!  Time proves thy sanity.