1
Talk not of the banquet Remembrance provides
Till shadows with truth can be class’d:
One hour in the presence of new-born delights
O’ervalues an age of the past!
Talk not of the flight or the ravage of time —
We’ll chase the dull fugitive on:
When life is a desert and friendship a dream
We’ll sigh for the days that are gone!
2
Can Mem’ry dissolve the chill fetters of age?
Will pain from her magic depart?
Can Fancy’s pale pictures on Memory’s page
Restore the rich warmth of the heart?
Of long-buried friendship, of far-fled delight
The spectres pass mournfully on:
They speak — but their whispers no rapture excite
They speak of the days that are gone!
3
But is there a joy which for ever departs?
Can friendship to earth be consign’d?
The joy or the love that was worthy our hearts
Must leave a rich relic behind!
Have traitors deceived us with thorns among flow’rs?
Well! let us their folly look on:
The rosebud of Fancy awhile has been ours,
The thorn to their pillow is gone!
4
O! let us not gaze on the wreck of our joys —
But build the fair fabric anew!
The day which no hope or no friendship supplies
Is a day without sunshine or dew!
Believe it — the rose-tree will flourish again,
Tho’ the dead leaf is trampled upon;
Our souls, like the sun, shall their lustre retain
Undimm’d by the days that are gone!