Of Any Old Man

Wreck not the ageing heart of quietness,
With alien uproar and rude jolly cries,
Which satyr like to a mild maidens pride,
Ripens not wisdom, but a large recoil,
Give them their withered peace, their trial grave,
Their old youth's three-scored shadowy effigy,
Mock them not with your ripened turbulence,
Their frost mailed petulance with your torrid wrath,
While edging your boisterous thunder shivers one word,
Pap to their senile shivering, drug to truth,
The feigned ramparts of bleak ignorance,
Experience - crown of naked majesties,
That tells us nought we know not - but confirms,
Oh think! You reverend shadowy austere,
Your Christ's youth was not ended when he died.

poem by Isaac Rosenberg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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