We know not the future, or what hands our own

May clasp, when another half decade is flown;

Our efforts may yet for a season be told

(For we re not so distressing, confoundedly old;

The crows may have stood at the edge of our eyes,

And left some tracks there that we haven't learned to prize;

The frost in our hair may be carelessly flung;

But our minds and our hearts and our souls may be young),

Still, grass-stalks, e'en now, may have lifted their heads,

That may die of the spades that will make our last beds;