Classic Poem

“I T'S strange,” my mother said, “to think”
Of the old house where we were born.
I can remember every chink
And every board our feet had worn.

“It's gone now. Many years ago
They tore it down. It was too old,
And none too grand as houses go,
Not like a new house, bought or sold.

“And so they tore it down. But we
Could talk about it still, and say
‘Just so the kitchen used to be,
And the stairs turned in such a way.’

“But we're gone too now. Everyone
Who knew the house is dead and buried.
And I'll not last so long alone
With all my children grown and married.

“There's not a living soul can tell,
Except myself, just how the grass
Grew round the pathway to the well,
Or where the china-closet was.

“Yet while I live you cannot say
That the old house is quite, quite dead.
It still exists in some dim way
While I remember it,” she said.