Arthur Stringer sets up a split between two kinds of people: the practical, hardened person of “blood and iron” and the dreamy singer. But he insists each contains the other. Beneath the cynic’s frown and daily labor, a poet lies buried; beneath the speaker’s music, a forceful, granite-like man is hidden. The speaker feels his own lost vitality stir when he sees the city’s skyline, markets, and humming power. At the same time, the dreamer’s sad song can wake the poet buried in the busy man. The mood is wistful and a little lonely, yet also tender. It suggests that no one is only one thing, and that our abandoned selves call to each other across very different lives.
Dreamers — Summary
There's a poet tombed in you, Man of blood and iron! There's a dreamer dead and buried Deep beneath your cynic frown, Deep beneath your toil!
And deep beneath my music, There's a strong man stirs in me; There's a ghost of blood and granite Coffined in this madness Carpentered of Song!
You live your day and drain it; I weave my dream and lose it; But the red blood lost in me awakens still at times, At all your city's sky-line, At all your roaring market-place, At all its hum of power-- And the poet dead within you stirs Still at the plaintive note or two Of a dreamer's plaintive song!