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                  [Illustration: _The Cameo Series_]




                             A Minor Poet

                 [Illustration: portrait of Amy Levy]




                             A Minor Poet
                            And other Verse

                                  by
                               AMY LEVY

                             CAMEO SERIES

                    T.FISHER UNWIN PATERNOSTER SQ.
                         LONDON E.C. MDCCCXCI.

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                           _Second Edition_

This volume is a reprint of that issued in 1884, with the addition of a
sonnet and a translation, from a volume published in Cambridge in 1881,
                         and now out of print.

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_Contents._

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                                                                    PAGE

_To a Dead Poet_                                                      11

A MINOR POET                                                          13

XANTIPPE                                                              23

MEDEA                                                                 35

SINFONIA EROICA                                                       58

TO SYLVIA                                                             60

A GREEK GIRL                                                          62

MAGDALEN                                                              65

CHRISTOPHER FOUND                                                     69

A DIRGE                                                               74

THE SICK MAN AND THE NIGHTINGALE                                      76

TO DEATH                                                              77

A JUNE-TIDE ECHO                                                      78

TO LALLIE                                                             80

IN A MINOR KEY                                                        83

A FAREWELL                                                            86

A CROSS-ROAD EPITAPH                                                  87

EPITAPH                                                               88

SONNET                                                                89

TRANSLATED FROM GEIBEL                                                90

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_To a Dead Poet._


    _I knew not if to laugh or weep;_
      _They sat and talked of you--_
    _“’Twas here he sat; ’twas this he said!_
      _’Twas that he used to do._

    _“Here is the book wherein he read,_
      _The room, wherein he dwelt;_
    _And he” (they said) “was such a man,_
      _Such things he thought and felt.”_

    _I sat and sat, I did not stir;_
      _They talked and talked away._
    _I was as mute as any stone,_
      _I had no word to say._

    _They talked and talked; like to a stone_
      _My heart grew in my breast--_
    _I, who had never seen your face_
      _Perhaps I knew you best._

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_A Minor Poet._

          “_What should such fellows as I do,_
    _Crawling between earth and heaven?_”

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    Here is the phial; here I turn the key
    Sharp in the lock. Click!--there’s no doubt it turned.
    This is the third time; there is luck in threes--
    Queen Luck, that rules the world, befriend me now
    And freely I’ll forgive you many wrongs!
    Just as the draught began to work, first time,
    Tom Leigh, my friend (as friends go in the world),
    Burst in, and drew the phial from my hand,
    (Ah, Tom! ah, Tom! that was a sorry turn!)
    And lectured me a lecture, all compact
    Of neatest, newest phrases, freshly culled
    From works of newest culture: “common good;”
    “The world’s great harmonies;” “must be content
    With knowing God works all things for the best,
    And Nature never stumbles.” Then again,
    “The common good,” and still, “the common, good;”
    And what a small thing was our joy or grief
    When weigh’d with that of thousands. Gentle Tom,
    But you might wag your philosophic tongue
    From morn till eve, and still the thing’s the same:
    I am myself, as each man is himself--
    Feels his own pain, joys his own joy, and loves
    With his own love, no other’s. Friend, the world
    Is but one man; one man is but the world.
    And I am I, and you are Tom, that bleeds
    When needles prick your flesh (mark, yours, not mine).
    I must confess it; I can feel the pulse
    A-beating at my heart, yet never knew
    The throb of cosmic pulses. I lament
    The death of youth’s ideal in my heart;
    And, to be honest, never yet rejoiced
    In the world’s progress--scarce, indeed, discerned;
    (For still it seems that God’s a Sisyphus
    With the world for stone).
                  You shake your head. I’m base