Classic Poem

Saint Augustine, Saint Augustine,
What memories come to me,
While treading down your quaint old streets,
Along the tropic sea!
Where old Fort Marion rears his walls
Of mouldering shells and sand,
And green against an opal sky
The tall palmettos stand.

Here mocking-birds entrance the air
With keen and quivering notes,
And through the long gray Spanish moss
The red-bird's love-song floats.
Here orange gardens scent the breeze
With wreaths of starry blooms,
And citrons with the lemons hang
Like gold in emerald glooms.

Like Ponce de Leon, I have come,
Old town, forever young,
To find your bubbling Fount of Youth
For ages sought and sung.
Alas! I find you fresh and green,
Blithe in your old-time joy;
But man, for all his plaints and prayers,
Is only once a boy.