—Great shame came upon me. I wended my way to my own house And I was sorrowful all that night, For the touch of man had bruised my manhood, And in playing to be wise and a judge before men, I found me foolish and a criminal before myself. If that the mountain-measured earth Had thousand-fold his mighty girth, One violet would avail the dust For righteous pride and just. Then why do ye prattle of promise, And why do ye cry _this poet's young And will give us more anon_? For he that hath written a song Hath made life's clod a flower, What question of short or long? As the big earth is summed in a violet, All Beauty may lie in a two-lined stave. Let the clever ones write commentaries in verse. As for us, we give you texts, O World, we poets. If you do not understand them now, Behold, hereafter an army of commentators will come: They will imitate, and explain it to you. THE SONG OF ALDHELM Come over the bridge, my merchants, Come over the bridge, my souls: For ye all are mine by the gift of God, Ye belong to me by the right of my love, I love With a love that is father and mother to men, Ye are all my children, merchants. _Merchant_: We have no time, we have no time to listen to idle dreams. _Aldhelm_: But I, poor Aldhelm, say you nay; Till ye hear me, ye have no time Neither for trade nor travelling; Till ye hear me ye have no time to fight nor marry nor mourn; There is not time, O World, Till you hear me, the Poet Aldhelm, To eat nor to drink nor to draw breath. For until the Song of the Poet is heard Ye do not live, ye can not live. O noonday ghosts that gabble of losing and gaining, Pitiful paupers that starve in the plenteous midmost Of bounty unbounded. Didst thou make me? Some say yea. Did I make thee? Some say yea. Oh, am I then thy son, O God, Or art thou mine? Thou art more beautiful than me, And I will worship thee. Lo, out of me is gone more great than me: As Him that Mother Mary bore, Greater far than Mary was; As one mere woman brought the Lord, Was mother of the Lord, Might not my love and longing be Father of thee? There will one day be medicine to cure crime. This youth, O Science, he knoweth more than thee, He knoweth that life is sweet, But thou, thou knowest not ever a Sweet.