The silver messenger. (Challis, Idaho) 1890-1912, 1900-04-17
A Rising Young Poet.

the boy-poet of Boise, It. SheIlev
Sutton.
The author of this poem is as
yet a beardless youth, not having
cast his first ballot. He has NOT
even enjoyed the benefits of a
collegiate education. Numerous
reverses, which his parents met
with soon after coming to Idaho.
deprived him of a college course.
His parents, however, who came
from the South, were highly
educated people, and from them
he received a degree of parental
instruction that enabled him to
acquire a frst-class education by
home study.
Beautiful metaphors, strophes,
SMILES and synedoches scintil-
late like gems throughout his
poems, and a Ceres horn of
classical quotation seems to stand
at the authors elbow.
At an early age, "the unknown
genius of future day" gave in
dication of the poetical tempera-
ment and the sovereign mind.
Unknown to the world, at the
age of seven, and without sign
ing his name or non de plume he
wrote 1.-The Grave of Catherine
Lee" which poem was published
by various newspapers over the
country not knowing the author
was a mere child.
There is a vein of melancholy
running through his poetry that
is both sad and sweet, mysterious
and musical; and, in some instan-
ces, is almost as fascinating pa
thetic and wierd as anything in
Poe.
Prometheus-like fate-fettered,
he seems to have borne "'the
gnawing beaks of sorrow and
despair" The same ghost-like,
uncanny raven that saddened the
soul of Poe with his despairing
dirge of "Nevermore r' seems to
sit, like a blue devil, above young
Shelley's chamber door. His ap-
pears to have been "a way of
barren years, a desert waste, un-
wattered, save by tears" and
the poets sensitive, high-strung
soul suffers something of
'.The crucial test, the awful agony,
The way Of Christ thro' dark Gethsemane,
The crown of thorns, the bitter, endless
| cry,
ELI, Eli, lama sabachthani ="
Thomas Carlyle has said that
"the greatest of all telescopes is
a tear" and it seems as If this
young poet was able to see many
things through his tears. de
says
"Affiictions make the Genius. Free from pain
Who then would prize the pleasures tna'
remain
The lot OF Milton, Dante, Tasso, Heine,
Tho eacR weismortal, made them eacn oiVins'
..If not by SIN. by suffering do we learn
That given way from which we cannot turn.
Beholding HeIne, beth paralyZed ana oiAnU'
The will of Heaven may appear unKino'
But great afaiction is furnace-hre
Which sanctihes the soul with pure Desire'
A noble purpose is in turn reveolea'
,, Hone like a pheuix, rises from the past
where All had vithered in the Boresn blast
The poets sarcasm is as keeI
, and cutting as sharpened SCI,
miter. He thrusts this nakeo
verse. like a lean knife, between
. the ribs of Rudyard Kipllng
&c reat Kipling-he who sang
Z The nraise of England in his Cockney slang
: How sad his lot Each genius has MS ou.S', :,
) And Kiuling's is--a weakness Tor poor 'ei'o
His defense of the Dead,
! ends with a little vitrlol an'
thorns for the living 49,
; IS too. shall rest. 'Tis time TO say WV
; Might" ,,.,,,n, write. /"
Though young sutton 1i" an,
no gift of divine ahatus sn'
; says he prefers to .e51r be calleu on
: rhymster, he is undoubtedly yont en
{ titled to the distinction OF poe poe
y He has the spiritual and lnteneU' =,
( nal m equipment of the poet, - am y
; here and there strikes a note uj r
: distinct and absolute poetry; ), n, ~
( defense of the Dead" we 40 ',,or ~
) think is a fair sample of his wof or
( and and cannot be considered d, u
! Chef. dae,tcre, but occasionally ,coin n
: civ Gives $ us a glimpse Of a ge9Giu Go
s and and a sovereign mind "tnae az 0I II
(. kind" kin He dives down deep p tb !
s ,;fa ntnu, At intervals and brings to III, 10
3 surface sur a pure and perfeeSt; H. PgG' %ri
5 of thought. There is IN daw n,v '" an
: ings a trace of honey A',5Sle aeH GO
: ths shs hi, hinpocrene sparkles Tor ,,;a
( instant irls here and there .;ga giVlbb b
5 divine guaranty OF gen;SI ;S mac
y Wv oo+ literature Is uleeO