Marissa Colleen Mullins

A moody child and wildly wise

Pursued the game with joyful eyes,

Which chose, like meteors, their way,

And rived the dark with private ray:

They overleapt the horizon’s edge,

Searched with Apollo’s privilege;

Through man, and woman, and sea, and star

Saw the dance of nature forward far;

Through worlds, and races, and terms, and times

Saw musical order, and pairing rhymes.

Olympian bards who sung

Divine ideas below,

Which always find us young,

And always keep us so.

Those who are esteemed umpires of taste are often persons who have acquired some knowledge of admired pictures or sculptures, and have an inclination of what is elegant; but if you inquire whether they are beautiful souls, and whether their own acts are like fair pictures, you learn that they are selfish and sensual. Their cultivation is local, as if you should rub a log of dry wood in…