Poem: The Spirit of Poetry by George Essex Evans

All things are Hers. Concealed or manifest,
   Found or unfound, Her Spirit lives in each --
Dumb till the Master-Soul its secret guessed
      And gave its silence speech.

All things are Hers. She is the Crystal Queen
   Of all men's vision, and the moving breath
Which through the greyness of the sordid scene
      Gloweth and quickeneth.

She is the flower-maid of the dreaming noon,
   The goddess of the temple of the night;
Where the berg-turrets gleam beneath the moon
      She builds Her throne of white.

She knows the Battle-Hymn of mighty wars
   When wind and ocean thunder on strand.
She knows the song the lonely river-bars
      Sing to the listening land.

Armoured and helmeted and spurred for fight
   She fires men's hearts to right the bitter wrong;
Yet sits She weaving of a summer night
      Flowers of a bridal song.

She gives the temper that has made men great
   And fashioned heroes out of common clay,
And welded firm into a mighty State
      The tribes of yesterday.

Youth's radiant vision, and the dreamy dawn
   Of the soft lovelight in a maiden's eyes,
And holiest joys of motherhood, are drawn
      By Her from Paradise.

She knows the Wheel-Song of the Stars that run
   Their glittering courses through the blue abyss.
Ere the round earth fell flaimg form the sun
      Her spirit was, and is.

She is the Phoenix, ever making true
   The dim tradition of the misty morn.
The crucible of science gives anew
      Her fairy form re-born.

All things are Hers -- but not with equal word
   Dowers She the pilgrims of the sacred shrine.
Only the Great Interpreters have heard
      Her melodies divine.

All things are Hers, and so to Her I bring
   Songs of the dreams that haunt me on my way --
I who scarce hear the rustle of Her wing
      Borne on the wind away!

First published in The Secret Key and Other Verses by George Essex Evans 1906