Volume I Part 90 (1/2)

Is it to lose the glory of the form, The l.u.s.tre of the eye?

Is it for beauty to forego her wealth?

--Yes, but not this alone.

Is it to feel our strength-- Not our bloom only, but our strength--decay?

Is it to feel each limb Grow stiffer, every function less exact, Each nerve more loosely strung?

Yes, this, and more; but not-- Ah, 'tis not what in youth we dreamed 'twould be!

'Tis not to have our life Mellowed and softened as with sunset glow, A golden day's decline.

'Tis not to see the world As from a height, with rapt prophetic eyes, And heart profoundly stirred; And weep, and feel the fulness of the past, The years that are no more.

It is to spend long days And not once feel that we were ever young; It is to add, immured In the hot prison of the present, month To month with weary pain.

It is to suffer this, And feel but half, and feebly, what we feel.

Deep in our hidden heart Festers the dull remembrance of a change, But no emotion--none.

It is!--last stage of all-- When we are frozen up within, and quite The phantom of ourselves, To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost Which blessed the living man.

Matthew Arnold [1822-1888]

PAST

The clocks are chiming in my heart Their cobweb chime; Old murmurings of days that die, The sob of things a-drifting by.

The clocks are chiming in my heart!

The stars have twinkled, and gone out-- Fair candles blown!

The hot desires burn low, and wan Those ashy fires, that flamed anon.

The stars have twinkled, and gone out!

John Galsworthy [1867-1933]

TWILIGHT

When I was young the twilight seemed too long.

How often on the western window-seat I leaned my book against the misty pane And spelled the last enchanting lines again, The while my mother hummed an ancient song, Or sighed a little and said: ”The hour is sweet!”

When I, rebellious, clamored for the light.

But now I love the soft approach of night, And now with folded hands I sit and dream While all too fleet the hours of twilight seem; And thus I know that I am growing old.

O granaries of Age! O manifold And royal harvest of the common years!

There are in all thy treasure-house no ways But lead by soft descent and gradual slope To memories more exquisite than hope.