983. To Critics by Walter Learned. Stedman, Edmund Clarence, ed. 1900. An American Anthology, 1787-1900

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

983. To Critics

By Walter Learned


WHEN I was seventeen I heard
From each censorious tongue,
“I ’d not do that if I were you;
You see you ’re rather young.”

Now that I number forty years,	5
I ’m quite as often told
Of this or that I should n’t do
Because I ’m quite too old.

O carping world! If there ’s an age
Where youth and manhood keep	10
An equal poise, alas! I must
Have passed it in my sleep.