Youth

I am not sure if I knew the truth

What his case or crime might be,

I only know that he pleaded Youth,

A beautiful, golden plea!

Youth, with its sunlit, passionate eyes,

Its roseate velvet skin —

A plea to cancel a thousand lies,

Or a thousand nights of sin.

The men who judged him were old and grey

Their eyes and their senses dim,

He brought the light of a warm Spring day

To the Court-house bare and grim.

Could he plead guilty in a lovelier way?

His judges acquitted him.