Honor

Divine abstraction, shadowy image, dreamMore vital than substantial shapes made strongBy all the tireless energies of wrong,—Who should deny thy being would blasphemeThe power that made thy loveliness supreme,Lending thee accents of auroral songTo comfort those who unto thee belong—Though they go down to dark Cocytus' stream.

Patient as Time art thou, eternal one!Yet who may change thy judgments—or destroy?The conqueror whom wily Egypt wonFound with life's honeyed draught a bitter blent;And Hector, fallen by the walls of Troy,Looked up, and saw thy face, and was content.