Rhymes of a Rolling Stone

At Thirty-Five

     Three score and ten, the psalmist saith,
     And half my course is well-nigh run;
     I've had my flout at dusty death,
     I've had my whack of feast and fun.
     I've mocked at those who prate and preach;
     I've laughed with any man alive;
     But now with sobered heart I reach
     The Great Divide of Thirty-five.

     And looking back I must confess
     I've little cause to feel elate.
     I've played the mummer more or less;
     I fumbled fortune, flouted fate.
     I've vastly dreamed and little done;
     I've idly watched my brothers strive:
     Oh, I have loitered in the sun
     By primrose paths to Thirty-five!

     And those who matched me in the race,
     Well, some are out and trampled down;
     The others jog with sober pace;
     Yet one wins delicate renown.
     O midnight feast and famished dawn!
     O gay, hard life, with hope alive!
     O golden youth, forever gone,
     How sweet you seem at Thirty-five!

     Each of our lives is just a book
     As absolute as Holy Writ;
     We humbly read, and may not look
     Ahead, nor change one word of it.
     And here are joys and here are pains;
     And here we fail and here we thrive;
     O wondrous volume! what remains
     When we reach chapter Thirty-five?

     The very best, I dare to hope,
     Ere Fate writes Finis to the tome;
     A wiser head, a wider scope,
     And for the gipsy heart, a home;
     A songful home, with loved ones near,
     With joy, with sunshine all alive:
     Watch me grow younger every year —
     Old Age! thy name is Thirty-five!