THIRTY-SIXTH VARIATION <br /> <br /> <br />THIS shred of song you bid me bring <br />Is snatched from fancy's embers; <br />Ah, when the lips forget to sing, <br />The faithful heart remembers! <br /> <br />Too swift the wings of envious Time <br />To wait for dallying phrases, <br />Or woven strands of labored rhyme <br />To thread their cunning mazes. <br /> <br />A word, a sigh, and lo, how plain <br />Its magic breath discloses <br />Our life's long vista through a lane <br />Of threescore summers' roses! <br /> <br />One language years alone can teach <br />Its roots are young affections <br />That feel their way to simplest speech <br />Through silent recollections. <br /> <br />That tongue is ours. How few the words <br />We need to know a brother! <br />As simple are the notes of birds, <br />Yet well they know each other. <br /> <br />This freezing month of ice and snow <br />That brings our lives together <br />Lends to our year a living glow <br />That warms its wintry weather. <br /> <br />So let us meet as eve draws nigh, <br />And life matures and mellows, <br />Till Nature whispers with a sigh, <br />'Good-night, my dear old fellows!'<br /><br />Oliver Wendell Holmes<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-old-tune/
