Old Song

IS a dull sight  To see the year dying,

When winter winds  Set the yellow wood sighing:    Sighing,

O sighing!

When such a time cometh  I do

Into an old room  Beside a bright fire:    O, pile a bright fire!

And there I sit  Reading old things,

Of knights and lorn damsels,  While the wind sings—    O, drearily sings!

I never look out  Nor attend to the blast;

For all to be seen  Is the leaves falling fast:    Falling, falling!

But close at the hearth,  Like a cricket, sit I,

Reading of summer  And chivalry—    Gallant chivalry!

Then with an old friend  I talk of our youth—How ’twas gladsome, but often  Foolish, forsooth:    But gladsome, gladsome!

Or, to get merry,  We sing some old

That made the wood ring again  In summer time—    Sweet summer time!

Then go we smoking,  Silent and snug:

Naught passes between us,  Save a brown jug—    Sometimes!

And sometimes a tear  Will rise in each eye,

Seeing the two old friends  So merrily—    So merrily!

And ere to bed  Go we, go we,

Down on the ashes  We kneel on the knee,    Praying together!

Thus, then, live I  Till, ’mid all the gloom,

By Heaven! the bold sun  Is with me in the room    Shining, shining!

Then the clouds part,  Swallows soaring between;

The spring is alive,  And the meadows are green!

I jump up like mad,  Break the old pipe in twain,

And away to the meadows,  The meadows again!*