* * *

Along the noisy streets I wander,
A church invites me, it may be,
Or with mad youths my time I squander,
And still these thoughts are haunting me:

This year will fly, the next will follow
As fast, and all whom you see here
Eternity at last will swallow;
For some the hour is drawing near.

When I behold a lone oak thriving,
I think: age dooms me to decay,
This patriarch, though, will be surviving
As it survived my fathers' day.

If I caress a babe, Tm thinking:
Farewell, too soon I must make room
For you, and out of sight be sinking
My time to fade is yours to bloom.

Each day, each year in thought addressing,
I ask in turn ere it flits past
How it will be remembered, guessing
Which shall be reckoned as my last.

And when fate strikes, where will it find me?
In battle, on the road, at sea?
Will that near valley be assigned me
Where my cold clay at home may be?

The witless body's unaffected,
Nor recks where it must rot, 'tis clear,
Yet in my heart I have elected
To lie near places once held dear.

Then, even at the grave's grim portal
Let young life play with careless grace,
And neutral Nature her immortal
Beauty spread round my resting place.