To a Violin
WHAT wondrous power from heaven upon thee wrought?
What prisoned Ariel within thee broods?
Marvel of human skill and human thought,
Light as a dry leaf in the winter woods!
Thou mystic thing, all beautiful! What mind
Conceived thee, what intelligence began
And out of chaos thy rare shape designed,
Thou delicate and perfect work of man?
Across my hands thou liest mute and still;
Thou wilt not breathe to me thy secret fine;
Thy matchless tones the eager air shall thrill
To no entreaty or command of mine;
But comes thy master, lo! thou yieldest all:
Passion and pathos, rapture and despair;
To the soul’s need thy searching voice doth call
In language exquisite beyond compare,
Till into speech articulate at last
Thou seem’st to break, and thy charmed listener hears
Thee waking echoes of the vanished past,
Touching the source of gladness and of tears;
And with bowed head he lets the sweet wave roll
Across him, swayed by that weird power of thine,
And reverence and wonder fill his soul
That man’s creation should be so divine.
