Collected Poems
Song
Song
Oh, youth has thoughts a-plenty,
what matter if they're wrong?
For we who are but twenty,
we love not truth, but song.
And when we're old, and sodden
with creeds of bright deceit,
our songs will all be trodden
like dust about our feet.
What matter if the aged
imagine they have heard,
and keep the secret caged
like some sad singing-bird?
And what if those who're older
are wiser far than we?
For Wisdom, with a winding-sheet
is coming here to tea.