"The thinky parts of man's mind," huh? Sounds like Meredith was blazing a trail for both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the truthy and grippy Mr. Colbert.

This is beautiful.

As one who's long despaired of understanding poetry in any language, I probably have no right to comment. But my reading of the poem and text reinforce for me that those lines with the most "magical of associations", in this author's terms, are also the most obscure. Didn't Frost describe poetry as what was lost in translation? Meredith seems to expand that definition to include, as well, what's been lost in the original.

It takes me back. Meredith said something like this decades ago in the intro to his translation of Apollinaire's "Alcools". This is better, though.