THE GARRET.With pensive eyes the little room I view,Where, in my youth, I weathered it so long;With a wild mistress, a stanch friend or two,And a light heart still breaking into song:Making a mock of life, and all its cares,Rich in the glory of my rising sun,Lightly I vaulted up four pair of stairs,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.Yes; ’tis a garret—let him know’t who will—There was my bed—full hard it was and small.My table there—and I decipher stillHalf a lame couplet charcoaled on the wall.Ye joys, that Time hath swept with him away,Come to mine eyes, ye dreams of love and fun;For you I pawned my watch how many a day,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.And see my little Jessy, first of all;She comes with pouting lips and sparkling eyes:Behold, how roguishly she pins her shawlAcross the narrow casement, curtain-wise;Now by the bed her petticoat glides down,And when did woman look the worse in none?I have heard since who paid for many a gown,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.One jolly evening, when my friends and IMade happy music with our songs and cheers,A shout of triumph mounted up thus high,And distant cannon opened on our ears:We rise,—we join in the triumphant strain,—Napoleon conquers—Austerlitz is won—Tyrants shall never tread us down again,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.Let us begone—the place is sad and strange—How far, far off, these happy times appear;All that I have to live I’d gladly changeFor one such month as I have wasted here—To draw long dreams of beauty, love, and power,From founts of hope that never will outrun,And drink all life’s quintessence in an hour,Give me the days when I was twenty-one!
With pensive eyes the little room I view,Where, in my youth, I weathered it so long;With a wild mistress, a stanch friend or two,And a light heart still breaking into song:Making a mock of life, and all its cares,Rich in the glory of my rising sun,Lightly I vaulted up four pair of stairs,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.Yes; ’tis a garret—let him know’t who will—There was my bed—full hard it was and small.My table there—and I decipher stillHalf a lame couplet charcoaled on the wall.Ye joys, that Time hath swept with him away,Come to mine eyes, ye dreams of love and fun;For you I pawned my watch how many a day,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.And see my little Jessy, first of all;She comes with pouting lips and sparkling eyes:Behold, how roguishly she pins her shawlAcross the narrow casement, curtain-wise;Now by the bed her petticoat glides down,And when did woman look the worse in none?I have heard since who paid for many a gown,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.One jolly evening, when my friends and IMade happy music with our songs and cheers,A shout of triumph mounted up thus high,And distant cannon opened on our ears:We rise,—we join in the triumphant strain,—Napoleon conquers—Austerlitz is won—Tyrants shall never tread us down again,In the brave days when I was twenty-one.Let us begone—the place is sad and strange—How far, far off, these happy times appear;All that I have to live I’d gladly changeFor one such month as I have wasted here—To draw long dreams of beauty, love, and power,From founts of hope that never will outrun,And drink all life’s quintessence in an hour,Give me the days when I was twenty-one!