Chapter LXVI

Anon it happen’d that through others’ hands
My tales, pour’d forth to voice my loneliness
In echoing talk and song, were framed in plays,
And then were phrased in music; and, in time,
Arose like sighings of a human wind
Above a human sea, while, all about,
There swept, like surgings of a rhythmic surf,
The shifting scenes and singers of the stage.
And, chief of all the singers in those throngs,
Who best of all could body forth the truth
That most of all had seem’d to be inspired
By Edith’s influence, while in all I thought
Her love had ever lured expression on,
Was her own self.