STODDARD, Richard Henry

The Sea, I

You stooped and picked a red-lipped shell,

Beside the shining sea:

“This little shell, when I am gone,

Will whisper still of me.”

I kissed your hands, upon the sands,

For you were kind to me.

I hold the shell against my ear,

And hear its hollow roar:

It speaks to me about the sea,

But speaks of you no more.

I pace the sands, and wring my hands,

For you are kind no more.


It never comes again

There are gains for all our losses,

There are balms for all our pain,

But when youth, the dream, departs,

It takes something from our hearts,

And it never comes again.

We are stronger, and are better,

Under manhood's sterner reign;

Still we feel that something sweet

Followed youth, with flying feet,

And will never come again.

Something beautiful is vanished,

And we sigh for it in vain;

We behold it everywhere,

On the earth, and in the air,

But it never comes again.

An Old Song Reversed

There are gains for all our losses.”

So I said when I was young.

If I sang that song again,

’T would not be with that refrain,

Which but suits an idle tongue.

Youth has gone, and hope gone with it,

Gone the strong desire for frame.

Laurels are not for the old.

Take them, lads. Give Senex gold.

What ’s an everlasting name?

When my life was in its summer

One fair woman liked my looks:

Now that Time has driven his plough

In deep furrows on my brow,

I ’m no more in her good books.

“There are gains for all our losses?”

Grave beside the wintry sea,

Where my child is, and my heart,

For they would not live apart,

What has been your gain to me?

No, the words I sang were idle,

And will ever so remain:

Death, and Age, and vanished Youth

All declare this bitter truth,

There ’s a loss for every gain!