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Threescore and Ten

And voices which, to name me, aye
Their tenderest tones were keeping,-
To some I nevermore can say
An answer till God wipes away

In heaven these drops of weeping.

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Now God be thanked for these thick tears,
Which show, of those departed years,

Sweet memories left behind.

Now God be thanked for years enwrought
With love which softens yet:

Now God be thanked for every thought
Which is so tender it has caught

Earth's guerdon of regret.

Earth saddens, never shall remove

Affections purely given;

And e'en that mortal grief shall prove

The immortality of love,

And heighten it with Heaven.

457

Elizabeth Barrett Browning [1806-1861]

THREESCORE AND TEN

WHO reach their threescore years and ten,
As I have mine, without a sigh,
Are either more or less than men
Not such am I.

I am not of them; life to me

Has been a strange, bewildering dream,
Wherein I knew not things that be
From things that seem.

I thought, I hoped, I knew one thing,

And had one gift, when I was young—
The impulse and the power to sing,
And so I sung.

To have a place in the high choir
Of poets, and deserve the same-
What more could mortal man desire
Than poet's fame?

I sought it long, but never found;
The choir so full was and so strong
The jubilant voices there, they drowned
My simple song.

Men would not hear me then, and now
I care not, I accept my fate,
When white hairs thatch the furrowed brow
Crowns come too late!

The best of life went long ago

From me; it was not much at best; Only the love that young hearts know, The dear unrest.

Back on my past, through gathering tears,
Once more I cast my eyes, and see
Bright shapes that in my better years
Surrounded me!

They left me here, they left me there,
Went down dark pathways, one by one-
The wise, the great, the young, the fair;
But I went on.

And I go on! And bad or good,
The old allotted years of men
I have endured as best I could,
Threescore and ten!

Richard Henry Stoddard [1825-1903]

RAIN ON THE ROOF

WHEN the humid shadows hover
Over all the starry spheres,
And the melancholy darkness
Gently weeps in rainy tears,

Rain on the Roof

What a bliss to press the pillow

Of a cottage-chamber bed, And to listen to the patter

Of the soft rain overhead!

Every tinkle on the shingles
Has an echo in the heart;
And a thousand dreamy fancies
Into busy being start,

And a thousand recollections

Weave their air-threads into woof,

As I listen to the patter

Of the rain upon the roof..

Now in memory comes my mother,
As she used, in years agone,
To regard the darling dreamers
Ere she left them till the dawn;
And I feel her fond look on me,
As I list to this refrain
Which is played upon the shingles
By the patter of the rain.

Then my little seraph sister,

With her wings and waving hair,
And her star-eyed cherub brother-
A serene angelic pair-

Glide around my wakeful pillow,
With their praise or mild reproof,

As I listen to the murmur

Of the soft rain on the roof.

And another comes, to thrill me
With her eyes' delicious blue;
And I mind not, musing on her,
That her heart was all untrue:

I remember but to love her

With a passion kin to pain,
And my heart's quick pulses vibrate
To the patter of the rain.

459

Art hath naught of tone or cadence
That can work with such a speil
In the soul's mysterious fountains,
Whence the tears of rapture well,
As that melody of nature,

That subdued, subduing strain.
Which is played upon the shingles

By the patter of the rain.

Coates Kinney [1826-1904]

ALONE BY THE HEARTH

HERE, in my snug little fire-lit chamber,
Sit I alone:

And, as I gaze in the coals, I remember
Days long agone.

Saddening it is when the night has descended,
Thus to sit here,

Pensively musing on episodes ended

Many a year.

Still in my visions a golden-haired glory

Flits to and fro;

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She whom I loved-but 'tis just the old story:
Dead, long ago.

'Tis but a wraith of love; yet I linger

(Thus passion errs),

Foolishly kissing the ring on my finger-
Once it was hers.

Nothing has changed since her spirit departed,
Here, in this room

Save I, who, weary, and half broken-hearted,

Sit in the gloom.

Loud 'gainst the window the winter rain dashes,

Dreary and cold;

Over the floor the red fire-light flashes

Just as of old.

The Old Man Dreams

Just as of old-but the embers are scattered,

Whose ruddy blaze

Flashed o'er the floor where the fairy feet pattered

In other days!

Then, her dear voice, like a silver chime ringing,

Melted away;

Often these walls have re-echoed her singing,

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461

Why should love bring naught but sorrow, I wonder? Everything dies!

Time and death, sooner or later, must sunder

Holiest ties.

Years have rolled by; I am wiser and older-
Wiser, but yet

Not till my heart and its feelings grow colder,
Can I forget.

So, in my snug little fire-lit chamber,

Sit I alone;

And, as I gaze in the coals, I remember

Days long agone!

George Arnold [1834-1865]

THE OLD MAN DREAMS

OH for one hour of youthful joy!
Give back my twentieth spring!
I'd rather laugh, a bright-haired boy,
Than reign, a gray-beard king.

Off with the spoils of wrinkled age!
Away with Learning's crown!
Tear out life's Wisdom-written page,
And dash its trophies down!

One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood's fount of flame!
Give me one giddy, reeling dream

Of life all love and fame!

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