Golden gates of Fifty Years,
May our two your latchet press!
Garden of the Sunset Land,
Hold their dearest happiness.

Then a quiet walk again :

Then a wicket in the wall;

Then one, stepping on alone,

Then two at the Heart of All!

WILLIAM C. GANNETT.

THE OLD MAN DREAMS.

FOR one hour of youthful joy! Give back my twentieth spring! I'd rather laugh, a bright-haired boy, Than reign, a gray-beard king.

Off with the spoils of wrinkled age!
Away with learning's crown!
Tear out life's wisdom-written page,
And dash its trophies down!

One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood's fount of flame!
Give me one giddy, reeling dream
Of life all love and fame!

THE OLD MAN DREAMS.

My listening angel heard the prayer,
And, calmly smiling, said,

"If I but touch thy silvered hair
Thy hasty wish hath sped.

"But is there nothing in thy track
To bid thee fondly stay

While the swift seasons hurry back
To find the wished-for day?"

"Ah, truest soul of womankind!
Without thee what were life?
One bliss I cannot leave behind:
I'll take-my-precious-wife!"

The angel took a sapphire pen
And wrote in rainbow dew;
“The man would be a boy again,
And be a husband too!"

"And is there nothing yet unsaid,
Before the change appears?
Remember, all their gifts have fled
With those dissolving years."

"Why, yes, for memory would recall My fond paternal joys;

I could not bear to leave them all

I'll take-my-girl — and — boys."

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The smiling angel dropped his pen,
"Why this will never do;

The man would be a boy again,
And be a father too!"

And so I laughed, my laughter woke
The household with its noise,-

And wrote my dream, when morning broke,
To please the gray-haired boys.

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

THE DAISY FOLLOWS SOFT THE SUN.

HE daisy follows soft the sun,

Sits shyly at his feet.

walk is done,

He, waking, finds the flower near.
"Wherefore, marauder, art thou here?"

"Because, sir, love is sweet!"

We are the flower, Thou the sun!
Forgive us, if as days decline,

We nearer steal to Thee,

Enamoured of the parting west,

The peace, the flight, the amethyst,
Night's possibility!

EMILY DICKINSON.

All the breath and the bloom of the year in the bag of one bee
All unconscious I beheld her

And at night the septette of Beethoven

And how could you dream of meeting?

And on her lover's arm she leant

A picture-frame for you to fill

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Ask me no more: the moon may draw the sea

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Be happy now with him, and love him who loves thee
Between the dark and the daylight

By a clear well, within a little field

Dimpled and flushed and dewy pink he lies
Do not write. I am sad, and would my life were o'er
Do you remember that most perfect night.
Each man's chimney is his golden mile-stone
Escape me?

First time he kissed me, he but only kissed
From you have I been absent in the spring
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may
Gentle severity, repulses mild.

God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Good-night! I have to say good-night
Had I but earlier known that from the eyes
Have you got a brook in your little heart
He gather'd blue forget-me-nots
Here, a little child, I stand

Here's the garden she walked across
Her father loved me; oft invited me
Her fingers shame the ivory keys

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He who loves truly, grows in force and might
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways
How many new years have grown old
How many times do I love thee, dear?
How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st
How strange a thing a lover seems

How sweet it were, if without feeble fright
How your sweet face revives again

I am not a prosperous man

I count my times by times that I meet thee

If by any device or knowledge

If I had an eagle's wings

If I had known in the morning