LXXXVII.
             
        I past beside the reverend walls
            In which of old I wore the gown;
            I roved at random thro’ the town,
        And saw the tumult of the halls;

        And heard one more in college fanes
            The storm their high-built organs make,
            And thunder-music, rolling, shake
        The prophet blazon’d on the panes;

        And caught one more the distant shout,
            The measured pulse of racing oars
            Among the willows; paced the shores
        And many a bridge, and all about

        The same gray flats again, and felt
            The same, but not the same; and last
            Up that long walk of limes I past
        To see the rooms in which he dwelt.

        Another name was on the door:
            I linger’d; all within was noise
            Of songs, and clapping hands, and boys
        That crash’d the glass and beat the floor;

        Where once we held debate, a band
            Of youthful friends, on mind and art,
            And labour, and the changing mart,
        And all the framework of the land;

        When one would aim an arrow fair,
            But send it slackly from the string;
            And one would pierce an outer ring,
        And one an inner, here and there;

        And last the master-bowman, he,
            Would cleave the mark. A willing ear
            We lent him. Who, but hung to hear
        The rapt oration flowing free

        From point to point, with power and grace
            And music in the bounds of law,
            To those conclusions when we saw
        The God within him light his face,

        And seem to lift the form, and glow
            In azure orbits heavenly wise;
            And over those ethereal eyes
        The bar of Michael Angelo.