 | The poems of Richard Henry Stoddard |  |
TO BAYARD TAYLOR.
(On his Fortieth Birthday.)
“Whom the gods love die young,” we have been told,And wise of some the saying seems to be,
Of others foolish; as it is of thee,
Who proven hast whom the gods love live old.
For have not forty seasons o'er thee rolled,
The worst propitious, setting like a sea
Toward the haven of Prosperity,
Now full in sight, so fair the wind doth hold?
Hast thou not Fame, the poet's chief desire,
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A child in whom your differing natures blend,
And friends, troops of them, who respect, admire?
(How deeply one it suits not now to tell,)
Such lives are long, and have a perfect end.
| The poems of Richard Henry Stoddard | |