The Poetry Corner

Sexagenarius Loquitur

By Arthur Conan Doyle

From our youth to our age We have passed each stage In old immemorial order, From primitive days Through flowery ways With love like a hedge as their border. Ah, youth was a kingdom of joy, And we were the king and the queen, When I was a year Short of thirty, my dear, And you were just nearing nineteen. But dark follows light And day follows night As the old planet circles the sun; And nature still traces Her score on our faces And tallies the years as they run. Have they chilled the old warmth in your heart? I swear that they have not in mine, Though I am a year Short of sixty, my dear, And you are well, say thirty-nine.