I heard them talking, muttering and mouthing While we rubbed the linen on the shining wet stones, And for all the sun was blazing it made me shiver -- "Bonny, eh, she's bonny -- @3but she'll never make old bones!"@1 Yet, when I looked at them -- great-granny Dinger And Aunt Mary Holly will be ninety come June, Shrivelled up and yellow-gray and dim-eyed and wheezing -- Then I stuck my chin out and I said: "I'd just as soon!" I ran away to the pool in the clearing; There I saw the whole of me, smooth and pink and fresh . . . Well, let 'em stay till their old bones crumble -- I'll be going gayly in my sweet, young flesh! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE WOOING by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR ULTIMA THULE: THE CHAMBER OVER THE GATE by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW YOUTH, DAY, OLD AGE AND NIGHT by WALT WHITMAN THE EXILE by LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA SONNETS OF MANHOOD: 8. THEE by GEORGE BARLOW (1847-1913) IN THE STILLNESS O' THE NIGHT by WILLIAM BARNES |