Ah, did she pass so coldly by
The tenderest love in all the earth,
Making his lifetime one long sigh,
That never knew a morn of mirth?
High up the Paradisal stair
Did he refind amidst the glare
This matron's breast without a heart,
Transformed to Theologic Art?

Ah, well for us 'tis not our part
In England's fresher, stronger air,
To shrine this saint-elected pair,
This mythologic, cleric dream,
Instead of Shakespeare, our supreme,
Humane, and multiform, and clear,
Exhaustless, blood-red, near and dear.