Poet! I come to touch thy lance with mine;
       &nbsp Not as a knight, who on the listed field
       &nbsp Of tourney touched his adversary's shield
       &nbsp In token of defiance, but in sign
Of homage to the mastery, which is thine,
       &nbsp In English song; nor will I keep concealed,
       &nbsp And voiceless as a rivulet frost-congealed,
       &nbsp My admiration for thy verse divine.
Not of the howling dervishes of song,
       &nbsp Who craze the brain with their delirious dance,
       &nbsp Art thou, O sweet historian of the heart!
Therefore to thee the laurel-leaves belong,
       &nbsp To thee our love and our allegiance,
       &nbsp For thy allegiance to the poet's art.