<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=472620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>To A Blank Sheet Of Paper</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">WAN-VISAGED thing! thy virgin leaf<br>To me looks more than deadly pale,<br>Unknowing what may stain thee yet,--<br>A poem or a tale.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Who can thy unborn meaning scan?<br>Can Seer or Sibyl read thee now?<br>No,--seek to trace the fate of man<br>Writ on his infant brow.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Love may light on thy snowy cheek,<br>And shake his Eden-breathing plumes;<br>Then shalt thou tell how Lelia smiles,<br>Or Angelina blooms.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Satire may lift his bearded lance,<br>Forestalling Time's slow-moving scythe,<br>And, scattered on thy little field,<br>Disjointed bards may writhe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Perchance a vision of the night,<br>Some grizzled spectre, gaunt and thin,<br>Or sheeted corpse, may stalk along,<br>Or skeleton may grin.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">If it should be in pensive hour<br>Some sorrow-moving theme I try,<br>Ah, maiden, how thy tears will fall,<br>For all I doom to die!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">But if in merry mood I touch<br>Thy leaves, then shall the sight of thee<br>Sow smiles as thick on rosy lips<br>As ripples on the sea.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The Weekly press shall gladly stoop<br>To bind thee up among its sheaves;<br>The Daily steal thy shining ore,<br>To gild its leaden leaves.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thou hast no tongue, yet thou canst speak,<br>Till distant shores shall hear the sound;<br>Thou hast no life, yet thou canst breathe<br>Fresh life on all around.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thou art the arena of the wise,<br>The noiseless battle-ground of fame;<br>The sky where halos may be wreathed<br>Around the humblest name.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Take, then, this treasure to thy trust,<br>To win some idle reader's smile,<br>Then fade and moulder in the dust,<br>Or swell some bonfire's pile.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Oliver+Wendell+Holmes">Oliver Wendell Holmes</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=472620" data-title="To A Blank Sheet Of Paper de Oliver Wendell Holmes" data-description="WAN-VISAGED thing! thy virgin leaf To me looks more than deadly pale, Unknowing what may stain thee yet,-- A poem or a tale. Who can thy unborn meaning scan? Can Seer or Sibyl read thee now? No,--seek to trace the fate of man Writ on his infant b..."></div> </div> </div>

solid border dashed border dotted border double border groove border ridge border inset border outset border no border blue green red purple cyan gold silver black