Amenophis and Other Poems Sacred and Secular :: :: University of Virginia Library

Days come and days go by,
Gliding so fast that one
Into another almost seems to run,
And Thursday dawns ere Wednesday is nigh:
One precious leaf each plucking from the tree
Of life allotted me.

Through the thinn'd boughs atop
Looks in the naked blue;
The flowers all fall'n, and scanty fruit in view,
Sweet-ripe to pull, or set for future crop;
And at the root the hidden worm I know
Mining to lay it low.

Ah tree, that once in youth,
When hope was green and high,
Dreamt its large leafy head would touch the sky,
Its roots all matted round the central truth!
How poor, by that vast visionary tree,
Looks the small shrub I see!

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Not rooted in pure truth
But in some shifting soil,
Where error and appearance mock our toil,
Till freezing Age seals the bold eyes of Youth,
Saying, ‘Look here! for all thy force and glow,
Thou canst no farther go.’

Yet, though the leaves may fall,
The life-sap is not shrunk,
But gathers strength deep in the knotted trunk,
And, losing part, has more than having all;
Condensed within itself to meet the stress
Of age, with cheerfulness.

And for the dreams of youth
Come larger aims, that bear
Elsewhere their fruit, their crown expect elsewhere,
In amaranth meadows of immortal truth,
Where the sun sets not all our night below
O'er flowers of golden glow:

Unfading leaves, and eyes
Wiped from all human tears;
Soft gliding of the years that are not years,
Eternal spaces:—not like those our sighs
Note as they pass, while, fast as bubbles fly,
Days come and days go by.