The North Star Whispers to the Blacksmith's Son

The North Star whispers:    "You are one          Of those whose course no chance can change.          You blunder, but are not undone,          Your spirit-task is fixed and strange.          "When here you walk, a bloodless shade,          A singer all men else forget.          Your chants of hammer, forge and spade          Will move the prairie-village yet.          "That young, stiff-necked, reviling town          Beholds your fancies on her walls,          And paints them out or tears them down,          Or bars them from her feasting-halls.          "Yet shall the fragments still remain;          Yet shall remain some watch-tower strong          That ivy-vines will not disdain,          Haunted and trembling with your song.          "Your flambeau in the dusk shall burn,          Flame high in storms, flame white and clear;          Your ghost in gleaming robes return          And burn a deathless incense here."