Closeup of woman and door - Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris

“Heritage” by Claude McKay

Now the dead past seems vividly alive,
   
And in this shining moment I can trace,

Down through the vista of the vanished years,
   
Your faun-like form, your fond elusive face.
 
And suddenly come secret spring’s released,
   
And unawares a riddle is revealed,

And I can read like large, black-lettered print,
   
What seemed before a thing forever sealed.
 
I know the magic word, the graceful thought,
   
The song that fills me in my lucid hours,

The spirit’s wine that thrills my body through,
   
And makes me music-drunk, are yours, all yours.
 
I cannot praise, for you have passed from praise,
   
I have no tinted thoughts to paint you true;

But I can feel and I can write the word;
   
The best of me is but the least of you.

 

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