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A TOMB IN TUSCANY
119
My treasures vast shall serve and cherish
An art too heavenly to perish:
A beauty, born of passion pure,
That shall endure!"
So spake he. . . . Now he lies asleep;
But near him forms angelic keep
Unwearied watch, and from decay
Guard him alway:
Rare sculptured forms that blend his story
With Donatello's deathless glory,
And make mankind his debtors be
Eternally.
For lordly castles, as he said,
Have crumbled; aye, and bastions dread,
And temples grave and gardens gay
Are now as they:
Each vaunted image of his power
Has perished like a wayside flower,
But living in the art he fed,
He is not dead!
