SONNETS.
Reading edition
———
BY W. W. STORY.
———
MICHAEL ANGELO.
Fixed, as if nothing ever could o’erthrow
Its infinite faith, and firm as it had stood,
Stemming life-long misfortune’s sapping flood,
Is the brave head of Michael Angelo.
No smile, no fear, that noble face doth show:
A sublime purpose o’er it seems to brood,
In which no mean thought ever did intrude,
No busy interest hurry to and fro—
A will so stern, that nothing can abate,
Fastens the mouth. The anxious abstract eye,
Beyond earth’s gloomy shadow’s lowering nigh,
Beholds great angels in the distance wait—
And on those features, seamed with many a line,
Love seems like sunlight on rude cliffs to shine.
RAFFAELLO.
Thou wouldst seem sorrowful, but that we knew
That mild, fair brow, that serious seeking eye,
Where the pale lightnings of emotion lie,
Were caught from earnest striving to look through
These shadows that obscure the mortal view—
This hazy distance of humanity,
Far dawnings of the Beautiful and True,
And those divine thoughts that can never die.
Thy mouth, so tender and so sensitive—
Full and unrigid—formed as if to part
With each emotion—seemeth tuned by Art,
Like harp-strings, with each wandering breath to live;
And that same apostolic light is thine
Which made thy Christ and Mother so divine.