Poems (Odom)/My Birthday
For works with similar titles, see My Birthday.
MY BIRTHDAY.
I slowly turn time's pages o'er and find I'm growing old,The paler leaves of life are now beginning to unfold,Youth's rosy-red is fading fast, its colors turning gray,The shadows of the passing years are gathering on my way.In looking back how short they seem, the years that lie betweenThis day and one so long ago, when I was seventeen;And yet, time's great revolving wheel a dozen times and moreHas dipped its tire beneath the wave that laves the other shore.
What bright and girlish memories, what visions rich and rare,What varied fancies, precious hopes lie cold, and buried there! They wilted, one by one, and died, like all earth's transient flowers,And now they sleep within the tomb of dear departed hours.Gone, gone forever; naught now avails our wild, regretful tears,No wail of longing can recall our youth's receding years,In vain we stretch our Yearning arms for pleasures past—in vain!The morning dew, once brushed away, will sparkle not again.
My life has reached its noontide hour, the zenith of its day;My steps are verging now within the calmer, steadier way;I leave behind the summer fields of youth's unbroken green,Before me lies the calmer light of autumn's harvest scene;I know my brightest hours are past, forever past—and yet,My heart in looking backward feels no throbbing of regret; I would not, if I could, recall one single buried year,To shed its ghastly light around a dead past on its bier.
No, let them lie in slumbers deep as though mid-ocean's wavesIn surging billows rolled above their long-forgotten graves,I have no wish to lift the pall that on them darkly lies,I give their memory to-day no useless tears nor sighs.I know the passion flowers of youth, for me, are cold and dead;The summer roses of my life lie fading on my head;And yet, their bright and pristine bloom I care not to renew,It casts no shadow on my heart to watch their fading hue.
All blossoms of terrestrial birth live but a little while;I lay me down, and turn to meet my autumn with a smile. And will I pass through harvest time out in the wintry gale,Or shall I sooner lie with those who sleep within the vale?God knows—for many of my time Death's sickle has laid low,While few indeed are spared to meet the winter's falling snow.My gaze along life's retrospect its anxious searching sends,To find but vacant places now, where stood my early friends.
My childhood and my youth are gone; it matters little nowIf thorns or roses lingered once upon my maiden brow,—'T is many varied years since I my girlhood laid aside,To give my hand to one I loved—a happy, trusting bride.Now, as I write my passing thoughts, I hear the entry doorThrown open, and two little heels come ringing on the floor; My pen is laid aside while I with loving arms enfoldA childish form with bright black eyes and curling locks of gold.
Our darling boy! The only one now left where three were given—We gave the others back to God, He wanted them in heaven,The angels moored their little barks on the eternal shore;We know that we shall find them there, "not lost, but gone before."Full half my life is spent, and we will not be parted long,And God will give me help, I know, to suffer, yet be strong.I fain would see my precious boy grow to his manhood's prime,Then I will fold my willing hands and wait my Maker's time.