（For Shaemas O Sheel）

    One winter night a Devil came and sat upon my bed, His eyes were full of laughter for his heart was full of crime. "Why don't you take up fancy work, or embroidery¹？" he said, "For a needle is as manly² a tool as a pen that makes a rhyme！" "You little ugly Devil," said I, "go back to Hell For the idea you express I will not listen to： I have trouble enough with poetry and poverty as well, Without having to pay attention to orators³ like you.

    "When you say of the making of ballads⁴ and songs that it is woman's work You forget all the fighting poets that have been in every land. There was Byron who left all his lady-loves to fight against the Turk, And David, the Singing King of the Jews, who was born with a sword in his hand. It was yesterday that Rupert Brooke went out to the Wars and died, And Sir Philip Sidney's lyric⁵ voice was as sweet as his arm was strong； And Sir Walter Raleigh met the axe⁶ as a lover meets his bride, Because he carried in his soul the courage of his song.

    "And there is no consolation⁷ so quickening to the heart As the warmth and whiteness that come from the lines of noble poetry. It is strong joy to read it when the wounds of the spirit smart, It puts the flame in a lonely breast where only ashes be. It is strong joy to read it, and to make it is a thing That exalts⁸ a man with a sacreder pride than any pride on earth. For it makes him kneel to a broken slave and set his foot on a king, And it shakes the walls of his little soul with the echo of God's mirth.

    "There was the poet Homer had the sorrow to be blind, Yet a hundred people with good eyes would listen to him all night； For they took great enjoyment⁹ in the heaven of his mind, And were glad when the old blind poet let them share his powers of sight. And there was Heine lying on his mattress¹⁰ all day long, He had no wealth, he had no friends, he had no joy at all, Except to pour his sorrow into little cups of song, And the world finds in them the magic wine that his broken heart let fall.

    "And these are only a couple of names from a list of a thousand score Who have put their glory on the world in poverty and pain. And the title of poet's a noble thing, worth living and dying for, Though all the devils on earth and in Hell spit at me their disdain¹¹. It is stern work, it is perilous¹² work, to thrust your hand in the sun And pull out a spark of immortal¹³ flame to warm the hearts of men： But Prometheus, torn by the claws and beaks¹⁴ whose task is never done, Would be tortured another eternity¹⁵ to go stealing fire again."