As the barometer foretells the storm
While still the skies are clear, the weather warm,
So something in us, as old age draws near,
Betrays the pressure of the atmosphere. 
The nimble mercury, ere we are aware,
Descends the elastic ladder of the air;
The telltale blood in artery and vein
Sinks from its higher levels in the brain;
Whatever poet, orator, or sage
May say of it, old age is still old age. 
It is the waning, not the crescent moon;
The dusk of evening, not the blaze of noon: 
It is not strength, but weakness; not desire,
But its surcease; not the fierce heat of fire,
The burning and consuming element,
But that of ashes and of embers spent,
In which some living sparks we still discern,
Enough to warm, but not enough to burn.

What then?  Shall we sit idly down and say
The night hath come; it is no longer day? 
The night hath not yet come; we are not quite
Cut off from labor by the failing light;
Something remains for us to do or dare;
Even the oldest tree some fruit may bear;
Not Oedipus Coloneus, or Greek Ode,
Or tales of pilgrims that one morning rode
Out of the gateway of the Tabard inn,
But other something, would we but begin;
For age is opportunity no less
Than youth itself, though in another dress,
And as the evening twilight fades away
The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.

A BOOK OF SONNETS

THREE FRIENDS OF MINE

I

When I remember them, those friends of mine,
  Who are no longer here, the noble three,
  Who half my life were more than friends to me,
  And whose discourse was like a generous wine,
I most of all remember the divine
  Something, that shone in them, and made us see
  The archetypal man, and what might be
  The amplitude of Nature’s first design. 
In vain I stretch my hands to clasp their hands;
  I cannot find them.  Nothing now is left
  But a majestic memory.  They meanwhile
Wander together in Elysian lands,
  Perchance remembering me, who am bereft
  Of their dear presence, and, remembering, smile.

II

In Attica thy birthplace should have been,
  Or the Ionian Isles, or where the seas
  Encircle in their arms the Cyclades,
  So wholly Greek wast thou in thy serene
And childlike joy of life, O Philhellene! 
  Around thee would have swarmed the Attic bees;
  Homer had been thy friend, or Socrates,
  And Plato welcomed thee to his demesne. 
For thee old legends breathed historic breath;
  Thou sawest Poseidon in the purple sea,
  And in the sunset Jason’s fleece of gold! 
O, what hadst thou to do with cruel Death,
  Who wast so full of life, or Death with thee,
  That thou shouldst die before thou hadst grown old!