Old Tree! thy branches, fifty years ago,
Thick set with spray and leaf, and widely spread,
Made a faint twilight on the ground below,
And never-ending murmurs overhead.

But now unheard the winds go wandering by;
From thy dead stem the boughs have dropped away;
And on its summit, perched in middle sky,
The clear-eyed hawk sits watching for his prey.

Henceforth, the softening rain and rending blast,
Summer's fierce heat, and winter's splintering cold,
Shall slowly waste thee, till thou lie at last
On the damp earth, a heap of yellow mould.

Thou wert a sapling once, with delicate sprays,
And from that mould another sapling tree
May rise and flourish, in the coming days,
When none who dwell on earth remember thee.