Get Your Premium Membership

Baccalaureate

 A year or two, and grey Euripides, 
And Horace and a Lydia or so, 
And Euclid and the brush of Angelo, 
Darwin on man, Vergilius on bees, 
The nose and Dialogues of Socrates, 
Don Quixote, Hudibras and Trinculo, 
How worlds are spawned and where the dead gods go,-- 
All shall be shard of broken memories.
And there shall linger other, magic things,-- The fog that creeps in wanly from the sea, The rotton harbor smell, the mystery Of moonlit elms, the flash of pigeon wings, The sunny Green, the old-world peace that clings About the college yard, where endlessly The dead go up and down.
These things shall be Enchantment of our heart's rememberings.
And these are more than memories of youth Which earth's four winds of pain shall blow away; These are earth's symbols of eternal truth, Symbols of dream and imagery and flame, Symbols of those same verities that play Bright through the crumbling gold of a great name.

Poem by Archibald Macleish
Biography | Poems | Best Poems | Short Poems | Quotes | Email Poem - BaccalaureateEmail Poem | Create an image from this poem

Poems are below...



More Poems by Archibald MacLeish

Comments, Analysis, and Meaning on Baccalaureate

Provide your analysis, explanation, meaning, interpretation, and comments on the poem Baccalaureate here.

Commenting turned off, sorry.


Book: Reflection on the Important Things