Choose Something Like a Star
O Star (the fairest one in sight)
Say something to us we can learn by heart
{There's one somewhere in the sky}
{There's one somewhere in the sky}
{There's one somewhere in the sky}
{There's one somewhere in the sky}
..the mob is swayed
To carry praise or blame too far
We may choose something like a star
To stay our minds on
And be staid
-- Original poem --
O Star (the fairest one in sight)
We grant your loftiness the right
To some obscurity of cloud --
It will not do to say of night
Since dark is what brings out your light
Some mystery becomes the proud
But to be wholly taciturn
In your reserve is not allowed
Say something to us we can learn
By heart and when alone repeat
Say something! And it says "I burn."
But say with what degree of heat
Talk Fahrenheit, talk Centigrade
Use language we can comprehend
Tell us what elements you blend
It gives us strangely little aid
But does tell something in the end
And steadfast as Keats' Eremite
Not even stooping from its sphere
It asks a little of us here
It asks of us a certain height
So when at times the mob is swayed
To carry praise or blame too far
We may choose something like a star
To stay our minds on and be staid