Part 1 — THREESCORE AND TEN
Reading edition
Who reach their threescore years and ten, As I have mine, without a sigh, Are either more or less than men— Not such am I.
I am not of them; life to me Has been a strange, bewildering dream, Wherein I knew not things that be From things that seem.
I thought, I hoped, I knew one thing, And had one gift, when I was young— The impulse and the power to sing, And so I sung.
To have a place in the high choir Of poets, and deserve the same— What more could mortal man desire Than poet's fame?
I sought it long, but never found; The choir so full was and so strong The jubilant voices there, they drowned My simple song.
Men would not hear me then, and now I care not, I accept my fate, When white hairs thatch the furrowed brow Crowns come too late!
The best of life went long ago From me; it was not much at best; Only the love that young hearts know, The dear unrest.
Back on my past, through gathering tears, Once more I cast my eyes, and see Bright shapes that in my better years Surrounded me!
They left me here, they left me there, Went down dark pathways, one by one— The wise, the great, the young, the fair; But I went on.
And I go on! And bad or good, The old allotted years of men I have endured as best I could, Threescore and ten!
Richard Henry Stoddard [1825-1903]