The Boys of Yesterday

Your youth is wrapped in mists of yesterdayand stored apart, a pathos-mended thingto look on only, with a soul-deep stinglike twilight echoes sobbing far away;the dreams you dream are absinthe-sweet, and paytomorrow's hours for memories they bringof phantom laughter sleeping with the spring,of hours you left when youth seemed tired and grey.

And I, the boy who takes your place today,am speaking to the boy of yesterday;to tell you, though the hours you had are mine,you left them as a deathless heritage;and that each star-souled hope which they entwinemakes youth unconquerable, strong with age.