Hand in Hand/An Invocation

by Alice MacDonald Fleming

An Invocation

A HARP Eolian
Is on my window-sill,
A box of pulsing melodies,
A wood-and-wire thrill.

Its songs are not its own—
There is no music there;
But it can phrase in tender tone
The symphonies of air.

So many poets dead!
Is all their power past?
Think of the songs that might have been
Had not death come too fast!

Why is my hand less skilled
Than wood and wire be?
Cannot one floating song be willed
To breathe its tune to me?

Dear bygone poets, then,
Here's paper spread and white;
I dip for you a silver pen—
Come, guide my hand, and write!