The following poem appears without attribution in The Knickerbocker; or, New-York Monthly Magazine, Volume 34 (New York: Samuel Hueston, Oct, 1849), page 360:


WILL YOU LOVE ME WHEN I AM OLD?

Will Affection still enfold me,
As the day of life declines,
When Old Age with ruthless rigor
Ploughs my face in furrowed lines:

When the eye forgets its seeing,
And the hand forgets its skill,
When the very words prove rebels
To the Mind's once kingly will:

When the deaf ear, strained to listen,
Scarcely hears the opening word,
And th'unfathomed depths of feeling
Are by no swift currents stirred:

When fond Memory, like a limner,
Many a line perspective casts,
Spreading out our by-gone pleasures
On the canvass of the Past:

When the leaping blood grows sluggish,
And the fire of youth hath fled,
When the friends who now surround us
Half are numbered with the dead:

When the years appear to shorten,
Scarcely leaving us a trace,
When old Time with bold approaches
Marks his dial on my face:

When our present hopes, all gathered,
Lie like dead flowers on our track,
When the whole of our existence
Is one fearful looking-back:

When each wasted hour of talent,
Scarcely measured now at all,
Sends its witness back to haunt us,
Like the writing on the wall:

When the ready tongue is palsied,
And the form is bowed with care,
When our only hope is heaven,
And our only help is prayer:

When our idols, broken round us,
Fall amid the ranks of men;
Until Death uplifts the curtain,
Will thy love endure till then?


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The British Library has sheet music described thus:

WILL YOU LOVE ME WHEN I'M OLD. Ballad [begins: "Will affection still enfold me"].
Author: William Henry West, the Elder.
Publisher: London, [1853]