Music

Mystic music flows into our hearts and makes
them grow tender,
And it also expresses the tenderness already
there;
It awakens memories old and neglected that
render
The present an antique museum of relics rare.

It opens the soul to visions of bright revelation,
While dreams of the may-be and might-have-
been charm all our thought;
It leads us along the fair highway of pure
aspiration,
Till we think that "I will" will unceasingly
walk with "I ought".

It brings to our knowledge new phases of self,
and it teaches
The lesson divine of the greatness of souls
that can feel;
It gives hint of the depth and the height of
emotion that reaches
Far down and far up to where throbs awful
woe and bless'd weal.

Or again, when our spirits are stirred in joy or
dejection,
Often music affords us an outlet for grief or for
praise;
And when we grow tender while bathing in old
recollection,
We oft give our emotion expression in soft,
longing lays.

Blessed music, sweet music, clear music, oh,
music supernal!
Holy music, chaste music, loved music, oh,
music benign!
That persuades us the present is part of existence
eternal,
And changes our minutes from commonplace
into divine.

Quillings In Verse
John Edward Everett
(Smith Center: ^___. 1912)
Pages 68-69