Children of the Night

Ballade of Dead Friends

     As we the withered ferns
      By the roadway lying,
     Time, the jester, spurns
      All our prayers and prying —
      All our tears and sighing,
     Sorrow, change, and woe —
      All our where-and-whying
     For friends that come and go.

     Life awakes and burns,
      Age and death defying,
     Till at last it learns
      All but Love is dying;
      Love's the trade we're plying,
     God has willed it so;
      Shrouds are what we're buying
     For friends that come and go.

     Man forever yearns
      For the thing that's flying.
     Everywhere he turns,
      Men to dust are drying, —
      Dust that wanders, eying
     (With eyes that hardly glow)
      New faces, dimly spying
     For friends that come and go.

         ENVOY

     And thus we all are nighing
      The truth we fear to know:
     Death will end our crying
      For friends that come and go.