Classic Poem

We are the old, old men,
Once fierce and high-hearted in frolics,
But now we are three score and ten
Or upwards--mere relics
Of the fine strong pageant of youth,
Which time in his spite and unruth
Has taken.
We are dim and palsied and shaken,
Ah! me--forsaken.

Where are the fair white maids
With flower faces and carriage
Straight as new-smithied blades,
Ripe, ready for marriage?
Now all are withered and grey,
Their beauty has passed away,
Ah! madness--
They are bent like hoops with sadness
And the world's badness.

Our voices are hoarse and drear,
As we sit and mumble together,
We have no good tidings to hear
We had sooner have never
(So we grumble together) been born,
That are so sick and forlorn;
Just shadows--
But once bright fishers of shallows,
Swift hunters of meadows.

We are the old, old men,
We have seen and endured much trouble;
It has turned us children again,
And bent us double.
Now we sit like a circle of stones,
And hear in each others' moans
Ill token.
For our sweetest thoughts were broken
Or else unspoken.