Edward FitzGerald

Old Song

TIS a dull sight
    To see the year dying,
When winter winds
    Set the yellow wood sighing:
        Sighing, O sighing!

When such a time cometh
    I do retire
Into an old room
    Beside a bright fire:
        O, pile a bright fire!

And there I sit
    Reading old things,
Of knights and lorn damsels,
    While the wind sings—
        O, drearily sings!

I never look out
    Nor attend to the blast;
For all to be seen
    Is the leaves falling fast:
        Falling, falling!

But close at the hearth,
    Like a cricket, sit I,
Reading of summer
    And chivalry—
        Gallant chivalry!

Then with an old friend
    I talk of our youth—
How 'twas gladsome, but often
    Foolish, forsooth:
        But gladsome, gladsome!

Or, to get merry,
    We sing some old rhyme
That made the wood ring again
    In summer time—
        Sweet summer time!

Then go we smoking,
    Silent and snug:
Naught passes between us,
    Save a brown jug—
        Sometimes!

And sometimes a tear
    Will rise in each eye,
Seeing the two old friends
    So merrily—
        So merrily!

And ere to bed
    Go we, go we,
Down on the ashes
    We kneel on the knee,
        Praying together!

Thus, then, live I
    Till, 'mid all the gloom,
By Heaven! the bold sun
    Is with me in the room
        Shining, shining!

Then the clouds part,
    Swallows soaring between;
The spring is alive,
    And the meadows are green!

I jump up like mad,
    Break the old pipe in twain,
And away to the meadows,
    The meadows again!