Youth Sings A Song Of Rosebuds

Since men grow diffident at last, And care no whit at all, If spring be come, or the fall be past, Or how the cool rains fall, I come to no flower but I pluck, I raise no cup but I sip, For a mouth is the best of sweets to suck; The oldest wine's on the lip. If I grow old in a year or two, And come to the querulous song Of 'Alack and aday' and 'This was true, And that, when I was young,' I must have sweets to remember by, Some blossom saved from the mire, Some death-rebellious ember I Can fan into a fire.