THE OLD CAFE

You know,

Do n't you, Joe,

Those merry evenings long ago?

You know the room, the narrow stair,

The wreaths of smoke that circled there,

The corner table where we sat

For hours in after-dinner chat,

And magnified

Our little world inside.

You know,

Do n't you, Joe?

Ah, those nights divine!

The simple, frugal wine,

The airs on crude Italian strings,

The joyous, harmless revelings,

Just fit for us — or kings!

At times a quaint and wickered flask

Of rare Chianti, or from the homelier cask

Of modest Pilsener a stein or so,

Amid the merry talk would flow;

Or red Bordeaux

From vines that grew where dear Montaigne

Held his domain.

And you remember that dark eye,

None too shy;

In fact, she seemed a bit too free

For you and me.

You know,

Do n't you, Joe?

Then Pegasus I knew,

And then I read to you

My callow rhymes

So many, many times;

And something in the place

Lent them a certain grace,

Until I scarce believed them mine,

Under the magic of the wine;

But now I read them o'er,

And see grave faults I had not seen before,

And wonder how

You could have listened with such placid brow,

And somehow apprehend

You sank the critic in the friend.

You know,

Do n't you, Joe?

And when we talked of books,

How learned were our looks!

And few the bards we could not quote,

From gay Catullus’ lines to Milton's purer note.

Mayhap we now are wiser men,

But we knew more than all the scholars then;

And our conceit

Was grand, ineffable, complete!

We know,

Do n't we, Joe?

Gone are those golden nights

Of innocent Bohemian delights,

And we are getting on;

And anon,

Years sad and tremulous

May be in store for us;

But should we ever meet

Upon some quiet street,

And you discover in an old man's eye

Some transient sparkle of the days gone by,

Then you will guess, perchance,

The meaning of the glance;

You'll know,

Wo n't you, Joe?