William Ernest Henley

Men may scoff, and men may pray,
But they pay
Every pleasure with a pain.

Men may scoff, and men may pray,
But they pay
Every pleasure with a pain.

The nightingale has a lyre of gold,
The lark's is a clarion call,
And the blackbird plays read more

The nightingale has a lyre of gold,
The lark's is a clarion call,
And the blackbird plays but a boxwood flute,
But I love him best of all.
For his song is all the joy of life,
And we in the mad spring weather,
We two have listened till he sang
Our hearts and lips together.

The smoke ascends
In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires
Shine and are changed. In the valley
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The smoke ascends
In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires
Shine and are changed. In the valley
Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun
Closing his benediction,
Sinks, and the darkening air
Thrills with the sense of the triumphing night,--
Night with train of stars
And her great gift of sleep.

What is the voice of strange command
Calling you still, as friend calls friend,
With love that read more

What is the voice of strange command
Calling you still, as friend calls friend,
With love that cannot brook delay,
To rise and follow the ways that wend
Over the hills and far away.

O Death! O Change! O Time!
Without you, O! the insufferable eyes
Of these poor Might-Have-Beens,
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O Death! O Change! O Time!
Without you, O! the insufferable eyes
Of these poor Might-Have-Beens,
These fatuous, ineffectual yesterdays.