Records and Other Poems By the late Robert Leighton |
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RETROSPECTION. |
Records and Other Poems | ||
232
RETROSPECTION.
When, after five brief years, I read againThe little book I ventured on the age,
Humbled I meet along the straggling page
The weak and limping children of my pen.
And these are they I deem'd so perfect then!
Scarce one my disappointment to assuage!—
'Tis well: their imperfection stands a gauge
That tells me I have deepen'd in my ken.—
There's little more comes to us when we seek
To make our old work a perpetual bay.
O, rather, feel our yesterdays were weak,
E'en though we cannot better them to-day.
From work outgrown a higher thought we borrow:
And thought to-day will be a deed to-morrow.
Records and Other Poems | ||