Thomas Moore

From “The Odes of Anacreon”. Ode 7

The women tell me every day
That all my bloom has past away.
„Behold,” the pretty wantons cry,
„Behold this mirror with a sigh;
The locks upon thy brow are few,
And, like the rest, they’re withering too!”
Whether decline has thinn’d my hair,
I’m sure I neither know nor care;
But this I know, and this I feel,
As onward to the tomb I steal,
That still as death approaches nearer,
The joys of life are sweeter, dearer;
And had I but an hour to live,
That little hour to bliss I’d give.