mhall46184@aol.com
Shall I Compute 1 Thee to a Summer’s Day?
A Lament for the Unlettered
They launch no voyages of discovery
To sail beyond the sunset 1 of their dreams
No pages open to them; no books, no boots,
No paths lead them to Constantinople or Rome 3
For the horns of Elfland 4 they listen not
Nor for the unheard pipes on a Grecian urn 5
The Red Book of Westmarch 6 is forever closed
And lines of lyric verse sing not to them
They cling to their precious palantiri 7
And launch no voyages of discovery
1 As Shakespeare did not say
2 From Tennyson’s “Ulysses.” Heinlein used the phrase as the title for his final novel.
3 Patrick Leigh Fermor and Hilaire Belloc
4 C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy
5 Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn”
6 Tolkien, Lord of the Rings
7 Tolkien again
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