Classic Poem

Ah , happy youths! ah, happy maid!
Take present pleasure while ye may;
Laugh, dance, and sing in sunny glade;
Your limbs are light, your hearts are gay;
Ye little think there comes a day
('Twill come to you, it came to me,)
When love and life shall pass away, —
I too once dwelt in Arcady!

Or listless lie by yonder stream,
And muse and watch the ripples play;
Or note their noiseless flow and deem
That life thus gently glides away,
That love is but a sunny ray
To make our years go joyously;
I knew that stream, I too could dream, —
I too once dwelt in Arcady!

Sing, shepherds, sing! sweet lady, listen!
Sing to the music of the rill!
With happy tears her bright eyes glisten;
For as each pause the echoes fill,
They I waft her name from hill to hill.
So listened my lost love to me;
The voice she loved has long been still, —
I too once dwelt in Arcady!