He never attained, except in a few poems, that union of sound and sense
which is characteristic of the best poetry. The touch of finality is not
in his words; the subtle charm of verse outside of the melody and the meaning
is not his -- he failed to get the last "touches of vitalizing force."
He did not, as Lowell said of Keats, "rediscover the delight and wonder
that lay enchanted in the dictionary." He did not attain
to "the perfection and the precision of the instantaneous line."
Take his poem "Remonstrance", for instance. It is a strong utterance
against tyranny and intolerance and bigotry, hot from his soul;
but the expression is not worthy of his feeling. A few lines
of Lowell's "Fable for Critics" about freedom are better.
The same may be said of his attack on agnosticism in "Acknowledgment".
"Corn", while representing an extremely poetical situation,
leaves one with the feeling of incompleteness: the ideas
are not adequately or felicitously expressed. There is melody
in the "Marsh Song at Sunset", but the poem is not clear.
Or take what many consider his masterpiece, "Sunrise".
There is one of the most imaginative situations a poet could have, --
the ecstasy of the poet's soul as he rises from his bed to go to the forest,
the silence of the night, the mystery of the deep green woods,
the coming of "my lord, the Sun." There is nothing in American poetry that
goes beyond the sweep and range of this conception. But look at the words;
with the exception of the first stanza and those that describe the dawn,
there is a nervousness of style, a strain of expression.
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