Since we the march of Time can not arrest,
Keep you in step with him till Time shall end:
Thus will you journey with more easeful breast,
Nor mar the rhythm that you cannot mend.
Nor ever yearn impatiently to reap
Harvest allotted unto mellower years,
But, having sown the seed, take care to keep
Its growth from tares till soaring stem appears.
Neither, when Summer from your life shall wane,
And Autumn fruit keep dropping from the bough,
Look back and sigh regretfully in vain
For joys no longer seasonable now:
Thus will your hours make music to the end,
And Life, you loved so, become Death your friend.
Alfred Austin (1835 – 1913) was an English journalist and a poet who was appointed Poet Laureate in 1896, after an interval following the death of Tennyson, when the other candidates had either caused controversy or simply refused the honor. It was claimed that he was being rewarded for his support for the Conservative leader Lord Salisbury in the General Election of 1895.