To-day, upon the self same ground, I see a stalk undecked and spare; The flower that once was golden-crowned, Has lost it’s gray—it’s head is bare. How like a child is this gay flower, With golden hair and graceful mien, Which comes to brighten many an hour And add a charm to dullest scene! But soon the golden turns to gray And middle life comes on apace; The gray then hurries on its way, And old age comes to take it’s place. LIVES AND LEAVES. Our lives are like the leaves That waken to the sun; Some fall from airy heights Ere Youth has scarce begun; And some are tempest tost, By an opposing power, And driven blindly on With every passing hour. Some cling to their support, In darkness and in light, And grow from day to day More perfect, strong, and bright. God grant that lives and leaves, When sunny days are past, May find, from adverse winds, A resting-place at last. TO-DAY. ’Tis not so hard to do what God desires, If, while we trust and labor on and pray, We look not back upon a Past decried, Nor forward to a Future yet untried, But do what Conscience prompts and soul requires, And live within the hours which make to-day. The Past is gone. The failure and the wrong We cannot expiate by vain regret; Forgiven have they been, and if to-day We wish to live more nearly as we pray, We must awake a grander, sweeter song Within those hours which have been given yet. While pondering o’er the failures of the then, We make a failure of the now and here; For life to-day shall lose it’s sunshine bright If it recalls the shadows of last night. While past mistakes possess the minds of men The heart itself will have no power to cheer. To-day we breathe, we move, we speak, we live, To-morrow’s sun for us may never rise. All that we do, or hope to do, or say, Must be confined within our short to-day, And all the blessings that our life can give Must be out-poured before the daylight dies. As we shall hope for nobler, higher things, While up life’s mount we seek the Heavenly way We must not measure, lest we may despair, The height to be yet gained by work and prayer; But like the lark, who soars and yet who sings, Make most of time God gives in our to-day. If future plans awaken thought and mind, And we shall say:—“Some day, some hour, not yet,” We rob the now of that divine reward Which follows duty, given us by God, And in to-day no pleasure shall we find; And thus to-day becomes a past regret.