The Cranes of Ibycus

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1. There was a man who watched the river flow
2. Past the huge town, one gray November day.
3. Round him in narrow high-piled streets at play
4. The boys made merry as they saw him go,
5. Murmuring half-loud, with eyes upon the stream,
6. The immortal screed he held within his hand.
7. For he was walking in an April land
8. With Faust and Helen. Shadowy as a dream
9. Was the prose-world, the river and the town.
10. Wild joy possessed him; through enchanted skies
11. He saw the cranes of Ibycus swoop down.
12. He closed the page, he lifted up his eyes,
13. Lo--a black line of birds in wavering thread
14. Bore him the greetings of the deathless dead!