William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. (1878–1962). Anthology of Massachusetts Poets. 1922.

An Old Song

WHEN I was but a young lad,

And that is long ago,

I thought that luck loved every man,

And time his only foe,

And love was like a hawthorn bush

That blossomed every May,

And had but to choose his flower,

For that’s the young lad’s way.

Oh, youth’s a thriftless squanderer,

It’s easy come and spent,

And heavy is the going now

Where once the light foot went.

The hawthorn bush puts on its white,

The throstle whistles clear,

But Spring comes once for every man

Just once in all the year.