Page:Poet Lore, volume 34, 1923.djvu/652

Even so our youth doth pass,
And desolate becomes our mortal state.
Even so the shadows flee,
And all delectable deceits; so die
The distant hopes
That were our living nature's dear support,
Forlorn and wrapt in gloom
Remains this life. His anxious gaze
The bewildered wayfarer, casting here and there,
Seeks to find end or object to his weary way:
Alas! he sees himself
A lonely alien,
Dwelling alone in unfamiliar world.

Ye hills and streams,
The long, warm light is fading in the west,
And soft descends the sombre veil of night;
Yet thou shalt not for long be left forsaken.
Soon in the distant skies
The first grey glow of dawn shall rise,
And soon the sun
Shall sweep thee with his fiery rays,
With radiant stream
Flood the ethereal fields.
But mortal life,
When once sweet youth is done,
Knows no new dawn,
Shines never more with lovely radiance.
Widowed it is until the feeble end,
And on the infernal shore,
Clouded with shades of the forgotten years,
The gods have set the tomb's forbidding seal.