Poems (May)/Push the bottle around, tom!

by Edith May

PUSH THE BOTTLE AROUND, TOM!

Push the bottle around, Tom,
 Fill your goblet quite up to the brim,
And when Care in its nectar is drowned, Tom,
 Sing a pæan for Time and for him!
Sing a pæan o'er Time as he dies, Tom,
 Let's hurry him on with a glee,
For the faster the old fellow flies, Tom,
 The better for you and for me.

'Tis a terrible thing to grow old, Tom,
 'Tis a terrible thing to perceive
Old Time with his visage so cold, Tom,
 Encroaching without asking leave.
And to see the sweet bloom on the lip, Tom,
 And the pleasant light in the eye,
Take flight with the years as they slip, Tom,
 So noiselessly, rapidly by.

There's a deepening line on your brow, Tom,
 There's one at the side of your nose,
And a touch of the rebel snow, Tom,
 Much thicker than you may suppose.
There's a graceless rotund in your hack, Tom,
 There's a wintriness, too, on your cheek,
And your voice has a kind of a crack, Tom,
 Whether you sing or you speak.

'Tis a terrible thing to be slighted, Tom,
 'Tis a terrible thing to know
That though you may still be invited, Tom,
 You're no longer asked as a beau.
To be sentenced to talk with papa, Tom,
 Though longing the while to take wing,
And to feel that the kindest mamma, Tom,
 Considers you not just—"the thing."

I wish, now and then, I had married, Tom,
 For mine is a lonely life,
But he who for time has tarried, Tom,
 May whistle, we know, for a wife.
Oh ho! for the hours of youth, Tom,
 The bloom of the earlier day,
Could we have it all over in truth, Tom,
 We'd manage it some other way.

But push the bright bottle around, Tom,
 And fill up your glass to the brim,
And when Care in its nectar is drowned, Tom,
 A pæan for Time and for him!
Sing a pæan o'er Time as he dies, Tom,
 Let's hurry him on with a glee,
For the faster the old fellow flies, Tom,
 The better for you and for me!