Ballade by the Fire
24 lines✦
lowly I smoke and hug my knee,The while a witless masqueradeOf things that only children seeFloats in a mist of light and shade:They pass, a flimsy cavalcade,And with a weak, remindful glow,The falling embers break and fade,As one by one the phantoms go. Then, with a melancholy gleeTo think where once my fancy strayed,I muse on what the years may beWhose coming tales are all unsaid,Till tongs and shovel, snugly laidWithin their shadowed niches, growBy grim degrees to pick and spade,As one by one the phantoms go. But then, what though the mystic ThreeAround me ply their merry trade? --And Charon soon may carry meAcross the gloomy Stygian glade? --Be up, my soul! nor be afraidOf what some unborn year may show;But mind your human debts are paid,As one by one the phantoms go.
✦