Classic Poem

You ask a " many-winter'd" Bard
Where hides his old vocation?
I'll give — the answer is not hard —
A classic explanation.

" Immortal" though he be, he still,
Tithonus-like, grows older,
While she, his Muse of Pindus Hill,
Still bares a youthful shoulder.

Could that too-sprightly Nymph but leave
Her ageless grace and beauty,
They might, betwixt them both, achieve
A hymn de Senectute;

But She — She can't grow gray; and so,
Her slave, whose hairs are falling,
Must e'en his Doric flute forgo,
And seek some graver calling, —

Not ill-content to stand aside,
To yield to minstrels fitter
His singing-robes, his singing-pride,
His fancies sweet — and bitter!