21. Inferential. VII. The Three Taverns. Robinson, Edwin Arlington. 1921. Collected Poems

Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869–1935). Collected Poems. 1921.

VII. The Three Taverns

21. Inferential

ALTHOUGH I saw before me there the face
Of one whom I had honored among men
The least, and on regarding him again
Would not have had him in another place,
He fitted with an unfamiliar grace	5
The coffin where I could not see him then
As I had seen him and appraised him when
I deemed him unessential to the race.

For there was more of him than what I saw.
And there was on me more than the old awe	10
That is the common genius of the dead.
I might as well have heard him: “Never mind;
If some of us were not so far behind,
The rest of us were not so far ahead.”