Classic Poem

A half a hundred years ago to-day
Seven youths joined hands to consecrate this shrine,
Where friendship's fires might never fade away,
But glow forever with a flame divine.

Youth is the father of all fellowship,
Begetter of the Brotherhood of Men.
Oh, when his suns in twilight darkness dip,
The old-time thrills are never known again!

We drift on desert seas of selfishness,
When cold Indifference steers the bark alone;
We heed no shipwreck's signals of distress,
Forgetting others' miseries in our own.

But here we anchor for one happy day,
And tread old memory-gardens of the past,
To pledge old friendships, made in morns of May—
God grant them leal and loyal to the last!

Let Youth's pink roses twine through locks of Age;
Come back, dear boy-hearts, from your tombs of yore!
Oh, let us read once more from one sweet page
In that lost volume we shall clasp no more!

Come, let us gather, old-time friends, again,
Within the temple we have loved so long;
See here the old ideals, free from stain,
The old-time precepts, sweet as heavenly song.

Here, like the seven golden candlesticks
Beheld by John on Patmos long ago,
Seven lights are set, on which our eyes may fix,
To guide our feet when darkness comes below.

One candlestick is Friendship, one is Truth,
And one is Faith, and Hope another yet;
And one is Peace, and one called Glow of Youth,
With Love high over all the others set.

O, be they not like torches quenched in strife,
Nor light of Laodicea, soon to wane,
But true as Smyrna, crowned with endless life,
And steadfast as the Philadelphian fane!