The Old Man

The Old Man

Why gaze ye on my hoary hair,

Ye children young and gay?

Your locks beneath the blast of care,

Will bleach as white as they.

I had a mother once, like you,

Who o'er my pillow hung,

Kiss'd from my cheek the briny dew,

And taught my faultering tongue.

She, when the nightly couch was spread

Would bow my infant knee,

And place her hand upon my head,

And kneeling, pray for me.

But then, there came a fearful day,-

I sought my mother's bed,

Till harsh hands bore me thence away,

And told me she was dead.

I pluck'd a fair white Rose, and stole

To lay it by her side,

And thought strange sleep enchanted her soul,

For no loud voice replied.

That eve, I knelt me down in woe,

And said a lonely prayer?

Yet, still my temples seem'd to glow,

As if that hand were there.

Years fled - and left me childhood's joy,

Gay sports and pastimes dear,

I rose a wild and wayward boy

Who scorn'd the curb of fear.

Fierce passions shook me like a reed,

Yet, ere at night I slept,

That soft hand made my bosom bleed,

And down I fell and wept.

Youth came - the props of Virtue reel'd -

But oft at day's decline,

A marble touch my brow congeal'd -

Blest Mother! - was it thine?

In foreign land I travell'd wide,

My pulse was bounding high,

Vice spread her meshes at my side,

And pleasure lur'd my eye;

Yet still that hand, so soft and cold,

Maintain'd its mystic sway,

As when amid my curls of gold

With gentle force it lay.

And when it breath's a voice of care

As from the lowly sod,

"My son, my only one, beware!

Not sin against thy God."

This brow the plushed helm displayed

That guides the warrior throng,

Or beauty's thrilling fingers stray'd

These many looks among.

That hallow'd touch was ne'er forgot!

And new, though time had set

His frosty seal upon my lot,

These temples feel it yet.

And if ere in heaven I appear,

A mother's holy prayer,

A mother's hand, and gentle tear,
That pointed to a Saviour dear,

Have led the wanderer there.

Unattributed

1:12, p. 48

1827.06.01