The Old Dreamer

Come, let's climb into our attic,
In our house that's old and gray!
Life, you're old and I'm rheumatic,
And it's close of day.

Lay aside your rags and tatters,
Shirt and shoes so soiled with clay!
They're no use now. Nothing matters
It is close of day.

Let's to bed. It's cold. No fire.
And no lamp to make a ray.
Where's our servant, young Desire?
Gone at close of day.

Oft she served us with fine glances,
Helped us out at work and play:
She is gone now; better chances;
And it's close of day.

Where is Hope, who flaunted scarlet?
Hope, who led us oft astray?
Has she proved herself a harlot
At the close of day?

What's become of Dream and Vision?
Friends we thought were here to stay?
Has life clapped the two in prison
At the close of day?

They are gone; and how we miss them!
They who made our garret gay.
How we used to hug and kiss them!
But 'tis close of day.

Where's friend Love now? Who supposes?
Has he flung himself away?
Left us for a wreath of roses
At the close of day?

And where's Song? the soul elected
Has he quit us too for aye?
Was it poverty he suspected
Near the close of day?

How our attic rang their laughter!
How it echoed laugh and lay!
None may take their place hereafter?
It is close of day.

We have done the best we could do.
Let us kneel awhile and pray.
Now, no matter what we would do,
It is close of day.

Let's to bed then! It's December.
Long enough since it was May!
Let's forget it, and remember
Now 'tis close of day.

Madison Julius Cawein

Madison Julius Cawein was born on March 23, 1865, in Louisville, Kentucky and died on December 8, 1914. Known as the “Keats of Kentucky,” his poetry often focused on nature, mythology, and the lush landscapes of his home state. Throughout his lifetime, Cawein published more than 30 books of poetry. He is remembered for his vivid and descriptive style and his ability to capture the beauty of the natural world. His works provide a window into the pastoral and often mystical world of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Madison Julius Cawein

Her Vesper Song.

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

In The Lane

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

A Confession

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

The Parting

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

The Old Home

They've torn the old house down, that stood,
Like some kind mother, in this place,
Hugged by its orchard and its wood,
Two sturdy children, strong of race.

This formal place makes no appeal.
I miss the old time happiness
And peace, which often here did heal
The cares of life, the heart's distress.

The shrubs, which snowed their blossoms on
The walks, wide-stretching from the doors
Like friendly arms, are dead and gone,
And over all a grand house soars.

Within its front no welcome lies,
But pride's aloofness; wealth, that stares
From windows, cold as haughty eyes,
The arrogance of new-made heirs.

Its very flowers breathe of cast;
And even the Springtide seems estranged,
In that stiff garden, caught, held fast,
All her wild...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Creaking Door

Come in, old Ghost of all that used to be!
You find me old,
And love grown cold,
And fortune fled to younger company:
Departed, as the glory of the day,
With friends! And you, it seems, have come to stay.
'T is time to pray.

Come; sit with me, here at Life's creaking door,
All comfortless.
Think, nay! then, guess,
What was the one thing, eh? that made me poor?
The love of beauty, that I could not bind?
My dream of truth? or faith in humankind?
But, never mind!

All are departed now, with love and youth,
Whose stay was brief;
And left but grief
And gray regret two jades, who tell the truth;
Whose children memories of things to be,
And things that failed, within my heart, ah me!
Cry constantly.

None can turn time back, a...

Madison Julius Cawein

Poppy And Mandragora

Let us go far from here!
Here there is sadness in the early year:
Here sorrow waits where joy went laughing late:
The sicklied face of heaven hangs like hate
Above the woodland and the meadowland;
And Spring hath taken fire in her hand
Of frost and made a dead bloom of her face,
Which was a flower of marvel once and grace,
And sweet serenity and stainless glow.
Delay not. Let us go.

Let us go far away
Into the sunrise of a fairer May:
Where all the nights resign them to the moon,
And drug their souls with odor and soft tune,
And tell their dreams in starlight: where the hours
Teach immortality with fadeless flowers;
And all the day the bee weights down the bloom,
And all the night the moth shakes strange perfume,
Like music, from the flower-bel...

Madison Julius Cawein

A Song For Old Age.

Now nights grow cold and colder,
And North the wild vane swings,
And round each tree and boulder
The driving snow-storm sings -
Come, make my old heart older,
O memory of lost things!

Of Hope, when promise sung her
Brave songs and I was young,
That banquets now on hunger
Since all youth's songs are sung;
Of Love, who walks with younger
Sweethearts the flowers among.

Ah, well! while Life holds levee,
Death's ceaseless dance goes on.
So let the curtains, heavy
About my couch, be drawn -
The curtains, sad and heavy,
Where all shall sleep anon.

Madison Julius Cawein

The Old Remain, The Young Are Gone

The old remain, the young are gone.
The farm dreams lonely on the hill:
From early eve to early dawn
A cry goes with the whippoorwill
"The old remain, the young are gone."

Where run the roads they wander on?
The young, whose hearts romped shouting here:
Whose feet thrilled rapture through this lawn,
Where sadness walks now all the year.
The old remain, the young are gone.

To what far glory are they drawn?
And do they weary of the quest?
And serve they now a king or pawn
There in the cities of unrest?
The old remain, the young are gone.

They found the life here gray and wan,
Too kind, too poor, too full of peace:
The great mad world of brain and brawn
Called to their young hearts without cease.
The old remain, the young are gone...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Old House In The Wood

Weeds and dead leaves, and leaves the Autumn stains
With hues of rust and rose whence moisture weeps;
Gnarl'd thorns, from which the knotted haw-fruit rains
On paths the gray moss heaps.

One golden flower, like a dreamy thought
In the sad mind of Age, makes bright the wood;
And near it, like a fancy Childhood-fraught,
The toadstool's jaunty hood.

Webs, in whose snares the nimble spiders crouch,
Waiting the prey that comes, moon-winged, with night:
Slugs and the snail which trails the mushroom's pouch,
That marks the wood with white.

An old gaunt house, round which the trees decay,
Its porches fallen and its windows gone,
Starts out at you as if to bar the way,
Or bid you hurry on.

A picket fence, grim as a skeleton arm,
Is flung ar...

Madison Julius Cawein