(To Oliver Wendell Holmes) <br />Strange spell of youth for age, and age for youth, <br />Affinity between two forms of truth!— <br />As if the dawn and sunset watched each other, <br />Like and unlike as children of one mother <br />And wondering at the likeness. Ardent eyes <br />Of young men see the prophecy arise <br />Of what their lives shall be when all is told; <br />And, in the far-off glow of years called old, <br />Those other eyes look back to catch a trace <br />Of what was once their own unshadowed grace. <br />But here in our dear poet both are blended— <br />Ripe age begun, yet golden youth not ended;— <br />Even as his song the willowy scent of spring <br />Doth blend with autumn's tender mellowing, <br />And mixes praise with satire, tears with fun, <br />In strains that ever delicately run; <br />So musical and wise, page after page, <br />The sage a minstrel grows, the bard a sage. <br />The dew of youth fills yet his late-sprung flowers, <br />And day-break glory haunts his evening hours. <br />Ah, such a life prefigures its own moral: <br />That first 'Last Leaf' is now a leaf of laurel, <br />Which—smiling not, but trembling at the touch— <br />Youth gives back to the hand that gave so much.<br /><br />George Parsons Lathrop<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/youth-to-the-poet/
