The friends that were young when I was, Like me show the scourgings of years;

The gold has whitened to silver,

The roses have drowned beneath Life’s tears.

In a grave in a nook in yon churchyard Where a fir tree sways, sobs, and swoons Beats a heart that I loved in youth’s morning When life was a lilt of love tunes.

Woe is me, how the dear vanished years

Surge up as I stand here today,

Where we stood, you and l, and gazed

Towards the dunes slumbering down in the Bay!

Like a sacrament seething with sweetness Come the memories of days that are gone, When you, dear, were near and you showed me The power of love — how it won.

Now there ‘neath that still mossy mound, Where the wild flowers droop and dream, Lies the heart, with my image in it,

Like a shell in a silent stream.

L’envoi

What shall come with the years is hidden, But this I can safely say,

That the charms which raised earth to heaven I have known round St. Peters Bay.

Rev. Thomas Gorman Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

The Reverend Thomas Gorman Photo courtesy of Robbie Thompson

Taken from

The Maple Leaf Magazine, 1925, page 181.

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