Santa Maria Del Fiore
SUMMITS and vales, slim cypresses and pines —
Arno and April and the Apennines!
And Giotto’s captive dream (what dream has ending?)
Lifting his Florence up to God for friending.
Arno and April and the Apennines!
And Giotto’s captive dream (what dream has ending?)
Lifting his Florence up to God for friending.
Her dream enfolded his. She willed and waited,
Conceived her popes and princes, and created.
Mother and Muse was she of mighty singers;
Grave Dante drank her breast; the beauty-bringers
In cell and cloister felt her mood and fashioned
Mystic Madonnas palely unimpassioned,
With cherubean Babes and saints immortal,
High men and humble kneeling at the portal.
Conceived her popes and princes, and created.
Mother and Muse was she of mighty singers;
Grave Dante drank her breast; the beauty-bringers
In cell and cloister felt her mood and fashioned
Mystic Madonnas palely unimpassioned,
With cherubean Babes and saints immortal,
High men and humble kneeling at the portal.
She was the pale Madonna, hers the story
Of pilgrim lords at pause before her glory.
And for the Babe she showed them Beauty solely
The while they worshiped: ‘Holy, O Thou holy!’
Of pilgrim lords at pause before her glory.
And for the Babe she showed them Beauty solely
The while they worshiped: ‘Holy, O Thou holy!’
Fear was her fault, too cold a doubt of duty,
Of brows that burned, of hearts that beat, for Beauty.
So Florence fell. Yet strangely sweet and vernal
Beauty is born again in her eternal.
Of brows that burned, of hearts that beat, for Beauty.
So Florence fell. Yet strangely sweet and vernal
Beauty is born again in her eternal.
Summits and vales, slim cypresses and pines —
Arno and April and the Apennines!
Arno and April and the Apennines!