Growing Old
What
is
it
to
grow
old?
Is
it
to
lose
the
glory
of
the
form,
The
lustre
of
the
eye?
Is
it
for
beauty
to
forego
her
wreath?
Yes,
but
not
for
this
alone.
Is
it
to
feel
our
strength
-
Not
our
bloom
only,
but
our
strength
-decay?
Is
it
to
feel
each
limb
Grow
stiffer,
every
function
less
exact,
Each
nerve
more
weakly
strung?
Yes,
this,
and
more!
but
not,
Ah,
'tis
not
what
in
youth
we
dreamed
'twould
be!
'Tis
not
to
have
our
life
Mellowed
and
softened
as
with
sunset-glow,
A
golden
day's
decline!
'Tis
not
to
see
the
world
As
from
a
height,
with
rapt
prophetic
eyes,
And
heart
profoundly
stirred;
And
weep,
and
feel
the
fulness
of
the
past,
The
years
that
are
no
more!
It
is
to
spend
long
days
And
not
once
feel
that
we
were
ever
young.
It
is
to
add,
immured
In
the
hot
prison
of
the
present,
month
To
month
with
weary
pain.
It
is
to
suffer
this,
And
feel
but
half,
and
feebly,
what
we
feel:
Deep
in
our
hidden
heart
Festers
the
dull
remembrance
of
a
change,
But
no
emotion
-none.
It
is
-last
stage
of
all
-
When
we
are
frozen
up
within,
and
quite
The
phantom
of
ourselves,
To
hear
the
world
applaud
the
hollow
ghost
Which
blamed
the
living
man.
