Мария Джейн Джюсбери (Maria Jane Jewsbury)

Youth in Age

   Why should a tear be in an old man's eye?
                                  Wordsworth.

I pass
Pleasantly on: the road leads to the skies,
And mine's a summer's journey.
Barry Cornwall.

MY hair is grey, and grey with years
That bore their weight of hopes and fears;
My sight grows dim, and blank the page
To them alike of bard or sage,
Friends greet me, but I scarce can see
The eyes that once were stars to me.
Ev'n the sweet tones of voices dear
Fall coldly on my languid ear:

Viands are tasteless, odours rare
Pass by me like the common air;
And strains that once my soul could bow,
Are music but to memory now.
Yes, Time, with unreproved claim,
Asserts his title to my frame;
And yet with failing pulse and limb,
I look on and I laugh at him;
He cannot touch my kingly part,
Nor dry youth's fountain in my heart.
Call not my life a leaden sleep,
O'er which no dream hath power to sweep;
My spirits may have ceased their dance,
And Thought a laggard grown, perchance;
Wit may provoke no repartee,
And Reasoning, learned toil may be,
Imagination fold her wings,
Or dip them but in memory's springs,

Yet hath my heart a golden haze
Reflected from departed days;
Remembrances in glowing crowds
Hang round it, like rich sunset clouds.
If my life's fever-hour is past,
Does love with tumult only last?
Ah no! Affection's sweetest balm
Is peaceful truth is chastened calm.
If I esteem it vain and wild
To be by youthful hopes beguiled,
Celestial ones I yet can find,
Undying as the immortal mind;
And joy's rich fruitage gather thence,
When not a blossom grows for sense.