 | The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes |  |
THE POET GROWS OLD
How I cut the fresh branches of succulent rhyme
In the spring of my years, my asparagus time!
To clip them, to bind them, how light was the toil,
As each morning they sprouted afresh from the soil!
In the spring of my years, my asparagus time!
To clip them, to bind them, how light was the toil,
As each morning they sprouted afresh from the soil!
Spring passed, still my pages of silvershod lines
Filled up like the pods on my marrow fat vines;
Uncared for they grew and unasked for they came,—
The peas and the poems,—with both 'twas the same.
Filled up like the pods on my marrow fat vines;
Uncared for they grew and unasked for they came,—
The peas and the poems,—with both 'twas the same.
And when the last crop on the meadow was mown,
When the apples were ripe, when the song-birds had flown,
My harvest of verse was awaiting me still
For the corn-field stood ready my basket to fill.
When the apples were ripe, when the song-birds had flown,
My harvest of verse was awaiting me still
For the corn-field stood ready my basket to fill.
But winter has come with his icicle-spear
And built his white throne on the grave of the year
The blossoms are snowflakes he flings to the gale
And the seed that he casts in the furrow is hail.
And built his white throne on the grave of the year
The blossoms are snowflakes he flings to the gale
And the seed that he casts in the furrow is hail.
The fields are all bare and the harvest is o'er
I come with my sickle and basket no more;
But a rusty old spade, and I prospect around
For the bread-fruit of Erin that grows underground.
I come with my sickle and basket no more;
But a rusty old spade, and I prospect around
For the bread-fruit of Erin that grows underground.
| The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes | |