Like some knowing, hungering bird,
Like some forewarned, huckstering drone of a butterfly,
Like a swift passion—she swept past my youth unhonied.
And I am now a very old man—almost dead;
I am now a very old ornament of lead;
Weismann and Ellis, Burton I have read
These thirty years in bed.
This room;
And the shadows lengthening on the lawn;
And the distant boom, boom of the world;