Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, OLD AGE, by JAMES HERVEY HYSLOP


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

OLD AGE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: What mean the days and years that pass
Last Line: Upon the silver wings of peace.
Subject(s): Aging; Freedom; Grief; Memory; Past; Liberty; Sorrow; Sadness


WHAT mean the days and years that pass,
Like winds that sweep the boundless sea,
And carry in their wake, alas!
The memories of youth for me?

Are they regrets that hold me fast,
And ever cloy me now with pain?
Or are they echoes of a past
That fall like fertile drops of rain?

The early sunlit happy days,
Of childhood and its careless glee,
Did live upon the wanton ways
Of freedom and its jollity.

No moaning tides of sorrow there,
Or keenest pain or bitter grief,
To ope the sobbing heart so bare,
Or bring the "sere and yellow leaf".

And no restraint or pain could foil
The long and happy days of youth,
Or clog the passing days with toil
To find the golden prize of truth.

If only sense and passion reign,
Or hold the soul in their firm stays,
The later sadder years' refrain
Will ever shade the harvest days.

If spirit and its inner life
Doth cleanse the soul's impurity,
The sunset days, all after strife,
Will tinge with fervent ecstasy.

The sated senses only pall,
When better wants are robbed their food.
We thrive here only under thrall
Of noble and religious mood.

'Tis not my grief: 'tis not my pain
That memory brings back to me:
In pensive moods of age I gain
The shores of God's eternal sea.

The spirit's toil mid worldly strife,
In winning here the soul's release,
Has brought to me immortal life,
Upon the silver wings of peace.





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