No courtier this, and nought to courts he
owed,
Fawned not on thrones, hymned not the
great and callous,
Yet, in one strain, that few remember, showed
He had the password to King Oberon's
palace.
And seeing a London seamstress's grey fate,
He of a human heartstring made a thread,
And stitched him such a royal robe of
state
That Eastern Kings are poorlier habited.
He saw wan Woman toil with famished eyes;
He saw her bound, and strove to sing her
free.
He saw her fall'n , and wrote "The Bridge of
Sighs,"
And on it crossed to immortality.
