Uncollected poems and prose of Edwin Arlington Robinson | ||
28
BALLADE OF DEAD FRIENDS
As we the withered ferns
By the roadway lying,
Time, the jester, spurns
All our prayers and prying—
All our tears and sighing,
Sorrow, change, and woe—
All our where-and-whying
For friends that come and go.
By the roadway lying,
Time, the jester, spurns
All our prayers and prying—
All our tears and sighing,
Sorrow, change, and woe—
All our where-and-whying
For friends that come and go.
Life awakes and burns,
Age and death defying,
Till at last it learns
All but Love is dying;
Love's the trade we're plying,
God has willed it so;
Shrouds are what we're buying
For friends that come and go.
Age and death defying,
Till at last it learns
All but Love is dying;
Love's the trade we're plying,
God has willed it so;
Shrouds are what we're buying
For friends that come and go.
Man forever yearns
For the thing that's flying.
Everywhere he turns,
Men to dust are drying,—
Dust that wanders, eying
(With eyes that hardly glow)
New faces, dimly spying
For friends that come and go.
For the thing that's flying.
Everywhere he turns,
Men to dust are drying,—
Dust that wanders, eying
(With eyes that hardly glow)
New faces, dimly spying
For friends that come and go.
Uncollected poems and prose of Edwin Arlington Robinson | ||