IDEAL PASSION
179
XXXV
Rebukeful reason, what words fall from thee?
"What actor-art is thine to doff and don!
Is God, then, an antique tradition?
In whose name dost thou pray, away from me?"
'T is true, steeped am I in idolatry,
Poor poet, bodied of religion!
It is the only food I feed upon.
Drunken with God I must forever be.
'T is true; each vintage yields me fellowship,
That time has crushed from man's long-suffering race;
But most the name that blessed my childhood's lip
Bears up my manhood to the throne of grace;
And though my bread in all men's tears I dip,
I eat it in old Calvary's weeping-place.
