Oft hear him murmur to the winds that blow
O’er his white locks and bury them in snow,
When, rous’d by rage and muttering in the morn,
He mends the broken hedge with icy thorn: -
“Why do I live, when I desire to be
At once from life and life’s long labour free?
Like leaves in spring, the young are blown away,
Without the sorrows of a slow decay;
I, like yon withered leaf remain behind,
Nipt by the frost, and shivering in the wind;