 | Three Hundred Sonnets |  |
11
HEART-YOUTHFULNESS.
Man's heart, if it but will, can keep its youthUnsoil'd, unsear'd, as if it were sixteen,
As full of impulse, and as fresh and green
And loveable of beauty joy and truth
And all things good as it hath ever been!
Who says that fifty, or five hundred years
Must make the heart feel old?—those years alone,
Though set with sorrows and full filled with fears,
Are powerless to congeal the heart within
And turn its early softness into stone,
Unless to Care and Grief be added—Sin:
And, where the Present in the Past is bold
Truly but humbly, having hope to win
A glorious Future,—can that heart feel old?
| Three Hundred Sonnets | |